


Mirror

by goldarrow



Series: Mirror!verse [1]
Category: Primeval
Genre: Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-25
Updated: 2019-08-25
Packaged: 2020-09-26 10:56:38
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 24,716
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20388580
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/goldarrow/pseuds/goldarrow
Summary: Stephen Hart returns after his death in the cage room.But is he really Stephen?A/N: Set after the end of S2, but before S3 gets going. A different kind of fix-it.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I mean no harm, I make no profit.  
It all belongs to Impossible Pictures.
> 
> The SF team belongs to fredbassett, who kindly lends them out.

The man knelt in the fourth floor window of the abandoned building, holding the tranq gun with an easy familiarity, the weapon comfortable in his hands as he sighted through the scope. On the ground across the street, Cutter's team looked as if they were starting to lose ground in their attempts at rounding up the remainder of the speedy carnivores that had swarmed through the latest anomaly in a dense pack. Fifteen had come through; twelve had been repatriated with the expenditure of much blood and sweat, and possibly even tears. The last three were proving to be even more difficult.

He waited and watched, as he had mostly been doing for the last month; he only assisted when they were in dire straits. His life and freedom depended upon him remaining unseen. 

These Archaeornithomimus, as he’d heard Temple call them, were quick devils. Not quite two metres tall, and only a little over three metres long, they dodged and bobbed like miniature plucked ostriches. 

“Late Cretaceous, carnivorous or at least omnivorous, translation ‘Ancient Bird Mimic’,” the young man had gasped, fingers flying across his laptop keyboard before he yelped and dodged another rush, with Fiver, the Special Forces soldier assigned to protect him, doing his best to keep the distracted lad out of trouble.

There were just too many abandoned buildings in this run down area of town; the Archaeornithomimus were able to avoid their pursuers and turn the tables on the humans all too often. Kermit and Finn, backup for Cutter and Abby respectively, were already down, Finn unconscious in the middle of the street, and Kermit half a block away against a fence, cursing luridly at the knackered status of his right ankle as Lyle and Blade tackled the creature lunging at him.

The dark-haired man knew he had to conserve ammunition; his batch of tranq darts was running low and he didn't know when, or even how, he would be able to replace them. There was no way he could count on a vet leaving his boot unlocked again. The last one probably ended up in a load of shit when his tranquillisers went missing, but the man couldn't worry about that right now. He had a job to do. 

Wishing he could make his presence known, he sighed softly as he sighted on the ornithomimid moving around behind Finn. Its muzzle was bobbing as it homed in on the smell of the blood trickling from the wound on the side of the soldier’s head. After a quick check to make sure no one was looking in his direction, the man let his breath out slowly and squeezed the trigger, not even twitching when the recoil smacked his shoulder and the sound of the shot beat against his ear. 

Finn's attacker jumped with a squawk and snapped at its flank where the needle was hanging, but it was too late; the dose had automatically injected when the dart hit. It began to wobble, and the man kept his blue eyes on it for just a moment too long. He looked away to check on the other members of the team, only to see Connor, sans laptop, making a break for Finn. The young man dodged both Fiver and the now clearly staggering Archaeornithomimus, but didn’t notice the second creature coming up on his other side. 

The man cursed as he quickly reloaded, raised the gun and fired in one smooth movement, hitting the second ornithomimid in the neck. Lowering the gun again, he reached for another dart, only to drop it back into the pouch by his side as he caught sight of Cutter staring in his direction, hand shading his eyes against the sun. He ducked down away from the window, feeling slightly giddy. Time to go. He'd done all he could for the moment. 

Levering himself up, he packed the gun into a long bag to disguise its lines and then headed for the staircase that would bring him out at the rear of the building, out of sight of the team. He could go down the alley and from there make his way along the road to lose himself in more populous areas. 

By the time he made it to the bottom of the staircase, he was bracing his hand against the wall to keep himself upright. Damn it. Now was not the time for his body to fold on him. No matter how tired and hungry he was, he had to put some distance between himself and the team. Between himself and Cutter. 

He slid out the back door without looking and headed down the alley, each step slower than the prior one as the last of his energy reserves ran out; which, he consoled himself later, was why he missed hearing the vehicle pull across the exit, and also missed seeing Nick Cutter step out of the Hilux and move to stand in front of him, blocking his way. 

"Stephen."

The man's head jerked up and his blue eyes widened for a second before rolling back in his head as he dropped to the ground in a dead faint. 

xXx

He woke up a couple of minutes later, surprised to find himself still in the alley, propped against the wall with Nick Cutter sitting beside him watching him quietly.

After one quick glance at his (former) friend and mentor, he dropped his gaze to his hands, watching them as they fiddled with a loose thread on his tattered jeans.

“Why?” Cutter asked quietly.

“Why what?” he replied, leaning his head back against the dirty brick, eyes closed.

“Don’t play games,” Cutter said, just as quietly, which was even more disconcerting, since Stephen had expected his reply to set off a Scottish rant. “Why didn’t you come to us, let us know you’re alive, how you came to be alive, where you’ve been all this time? You’re clearly in pretty rocky shape.” The words came rapidly, yes, but still calmly, with only a tiny tremor evident to reveal how difficult it was for the professor to remain in control. 

The man tilted his head to look at Cutter and smiled, just a little, through a sigh. So it ended. Not in a blaze of glory like last time, but with a sigh of regret. “I didn’t dare come to you. I knew what would happen if I did. You saw it. He died in front of your eyes.” 

He pushed himself with difficulty away from the bricks, head swimming, to sit facing Cutter. “I’m a clone,” he whispered. “Helen made me in a laboratory. Am I alive? I suppose so. But I’m not real. Not him. Never him.”

“Stephen. Oh, Stephen.” Cutter reached out to touch the man, who flinched away. “You obviously know us. Remember us. Do you remember the shopping mall, the raptors? And that arthropleurid?”

The man nodded dully. “Yes. So what?”

“Do you remember the dodos?” 

That earned a tiny grin. “Who could forget them?”

“Exactly,” Cutter replied with emphasis, tilting the man’s chin up so their eyes could meet again. “We are made up of our genes and our memories. It’s obvious you have all of Stephen Hart’s genes, and you seem to have his memories, too. You certainly have his sense of loyalty.”

“I suppose,” the man muttered weakly, eyes dropping again.

“Then, for the love of God, why do you think you’re not Stephen Hart?” Cutter’s voice was as firm as the grip of his fingers.

The man stared into Cutter’s eyes, searching for any hint of rejection, of fear, of disgust. He found none of those things. But he still couldn’t quite believe. “I - she - don’t you understand?” He tried to rise, but his legs still wouldn’t hold him and he folded back down onto the ground. “Helen grew me in a vat or something. Sod it, even I don’t know how she did it. The last thing he remembered was being torn apart. The first thing I remember after that is staring into Helen Cutter’s eyes as she welcomed me back, telling me I owed her for my existence. I’m a thing, Cutter. Just a - a thing she created for her own use.” Crossing his arms, he slumped back against the alley wall again and closed his eyes. “Please,” he whispered. “Just go. I’ll stay away, I promise I won’t bother you again. Leave me.”

“Yeah, right,” Cutter said sarcastically. “I’m going to walk away from the best thing that’s happened in the last eight months. I’m going to leave behind the best friend I ever had, the best friend I stupidly pushed away for months because I couldn’t get over myself.”

The man opened baffled blue eyes. “What the bloody hell are you talking about?”

“I’m talking about Helen’s little bombshell, Stephen. I’m talking about me telling you it was in the past, and then treating you like shit anyway. I’m talking about you being willing to die for me, you stupid git!” Cutter’s voice rose as he ground out the words. “Even after I spent six months being a bastard to you. That’s what I’m talking about!” 

The man could only stare at him, totally confused by Cutter finally plunging into a perfect Scottish rant.

Cutter took a deep breath and closed his own eyes for a moment. “I have lived with the most painful regret for the last two months. There were days when I didn't want to bother getting out of bed. Nights when I couldn't bear to sleep, because I saw your face in that cage room every time I closed my eyes. I don’t know why Helen made you either, lad, but she’s given me a gift I could never turn down.” 

The Scotsman stood up and held out his hand. “Come with me, Stephen. Come home. We need you - I need you.”

Stephen Hart allowed Cutter to grasp his arm and pull him to his feet and into a tight embrace.

xXx

Though Cutter had known the next few hours weren’t going to be easy, even he underestimated the major flap that walking back into the ARC with a staggering Stephen Hart practically welded onto his arm would cause.

Stephen whispered, "I'm sorry," as he caught his toe on the threshold of the ARC’s main door. Cutter held hard, barely keeping the younger man on his feet. Stephen's weakness worried him; he was much more used to the tracker being able to run rings around everyone bar the Special Forces men. 

"When was the last time you bloody ate?" Cutter asked. 

Pained eyes were turned on him and he muttered, "Never mind," just in time to look up at Abby's choked off scream. 

xXx

Stephen heard the noise, closed his eyes and took a deep breath in an attempt to brace himself for the onslaught he knew was coming. He'd spent more time with the SF lads and knew, better than Cutter did, exactly what was about to happen. 

“I’m sorry, I really can’t - “ Stephen sank onto the base of the ramp that led upward in a spiral around the ARC atrium. 

Cutter braced him in a sitting position and held his shoulder. “All right, Stephen, we’ll get some help.” He smiled at the girl who was staring, half-horrified, half-hopeful, at them. “Abby, get medical. He’s not well.” 

Abby’s mouth closed with a snap, she nodded quickly and hared out of the door at top speed. Connor was still staring, whispering “Oh, my God, oh, my God,” over and over, hugging and stroking his laptop as if it was the only thing anchoring him to a world that was suddenly spinning out of control.

Stephen braced his forearms on his knees, and allowed his head to hang between his hands in an attempt to remain conscious. Three days without food, two weeks with nothing more than he could scrounge from dustbins and leftovers carelessly abandoned in cafes had taken their toll. He'd spent the last six weeks living hand to mouth; he had no identification, no money, no contacts to help him. His only reason for continuing to survive was to do what he could to help his old team: his penance, if you will. 

Concentrating on breathing deeply, he felt Cutter tense beside him as the professor let go his worry over the younger man long enough to look around and see a phalanx of soldiers pointing very large weapons at them, with Abby behind them, mouthing ‘sorry’. Stephen looked up and ghosted a laugh. “You thought it would be easy?” he asked quietly. “Not a chance.”

Before Cutter could gather his scattered wits and control his rattled temper enough to respond, Captain Ryan stepped forward. “Professor, you need to move away.”

“Not a chance in hell,” Cutter responded, echoing and expanding Stephen's statement. “I stay.”

“Professor, we need to take him with us.”

“He goes, I go.” 

Ryan’s lips thinned and he snapped open the flap on his thigh holster. “Professor - “

A throat being ostentatiously cleared interrupted the rapidly escalating game of chicken. “Professor Cutter, no matter how pleased we all might be at the miraculous return of Dr. Hart, I really think you ought to allow the Special Forces personnel to perform the duties at which they are perfectly adept.” James Lester was probably the only person present who could have popped the bubble of stubbornness growing between the two men. 

Stephen chuckled weakly. “Good to see you, too, James.” He managed to hold onto consciousness long enough to tell Cutter, “It’s okay. The doctors are coming now, and I think I really need - a bit - of a nap.” With that, his eyelids drooped and he slumped against Cutter.

xXx

Ryan locked down his weapon and motioned Ditzy and the med team over, the sound of the gurney wheels rattling across the floor echoing from the rafters of the huge room. Stephen's hearing certainly hadn’t worsened; he’d been the first to realise they had arrived. “Professor, let Ditzy take him.”

Cutter hung onto Stephen almost with desperation. “I can’t - “

Ditzy squeezed his shoulder. “Prof, we won’t hurt him. I guarantee it. But we need to check him out. He’s in lousy shape, I can see that from here without any tests at all. Please, let us help him.”

Reluctantly, Cutter released the tracker to the tender mercies of the medical team. One quick heave and the unconscious man was on the gurney and being trundled off, Ditzy with one hand counting his pulse and the other tracking his breathing. Ryan motioned Blade and Fiver to follow on guard, telling them to check on Finn and Kermit while they were down there.

Cutter stood with his hands hanging limply, watching them take Stephen away. Abby moved up beside him and hugged his arm. “Professor?” she asked quietly. “Is that why you left as we were clearing up?”

“Yeah, lass,” he said. “I saw -“

“Hold that thought, Professor.” Lester’s dry voice stopped him. “Into my office, if you would.” He glanced around. “That includes the lot of you.”

They obediently trooped up the steps, Cutter and Abby in the lead, Connor right behind them still hugging his laptop but with a beaming smile on his face, and Ryan and Lyle bringing up the rear. Cutter wasn’t sure whether they were there as witnesses, or as guards for, or against him.

Once they were ensconced around the desk in Lester’s office, fortified by coffee delivered almost miraculously quickly by Lester’s personal assistant, Lorraine, the civil servant sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. 

“So, Professor Cutter, would you mind telling us just where you managed to pick up our little stray?”

“He’s not a dog!” Cutter knew his accent always thickened when he was upset. It was a dead giveaway of his emotional state, but right now he didn’t care in the least. “And I bloody well resent being threatened with guns by our own people!”

Lester stared at him for a moment. “I will grant that he certainly isn’t a dog. He’s too tall, and not nearly furry enough. I will, however, not apologise for the reactions of the Special Forces personnel. They did their job.”

“And what the bloody hell is that?” Cutter knew he was searching for a reason to fly off the handle. He had way too much nervous energy built up, and with nowhere to disperse it he felt as if he was going to take off like a rocket any moment.

The argument was rapidly falling into a black hole of irrelevancies. Abby smacked the table, hard, breaking the deadlock. And added a frustrated growl for good measure. “Will you stop it!” she exclaimed. “Professor, please, just tell us what happened! How did you find him?” 

She was probably the only person who could have got away with that, but Cutter vowed silently to have a little talk with her later, anyway.

“And where, and was he already in such bad shape, or did it come on in the car on the way back?” Ryan spoke quietly, with no challenge in his voice, but Cutter started to turn on him anyway. The captain continued, still calm, “We need to know if it’s just weakness, or some sort of illness.”

Cutter reined in his temper. “Weakness. He hasn’t eaten much lately.”

“Right.” 

Ryan passed the information quietly over his radio to Ditzy, whose response, “Thanks for the confirmation, boss, he’s hooked up to supportive IVs already,” was perfectly audible to all and lowered the tension in the room another few notches.

Dropping his head into his hands for a moment, Cutter took a deep breath. “Okay. When tranq darts started appearing out of nowhere for the third time in the last month, I looked around. I saw a flash from the window across the way. I decided to check it out.” He looked at Ryan and Lyle. “Looked like you had the third creature wrapped up, and the other two were already down from the tranqs. I took the Hilux and blocked off the back exit from the building. Next thing I knew, Stephen was staggering down the alley. He saw me and passed out.”

“Why didn’t you call us?” Ryan asked, again not demanding, though it obviously went against the grain. Cutter could see that the soldier wanted to, at the very least, shake him. There had been no telling who or what had been in that building. Ryan clearly felt that he could easily have been killed or kidnapped, and the captain had little patience with what he saw as Cutter’s stubbornness. The end of their first trip to the Permian had proved that.

“It was Stephen,” Cutter said impatiently. “There was no danger. Besides, he was so weak he couldn’t even stand up without help.”

“He could have been carrying a bomb,” said Lyle, his own expression close to Ryan’s. “Face it, Prof, if it had been someone else, or if he’d been a plant, you’d be dead right now.”

Cutter nodded. “Yes. That’s true. But he wasn’t. And I’m fine. But I would like to finish this damnable report so I can go and check on my friend.” He glared at the soldiers and then transferred the look to Lester.

The civil servant smirked. “Then stop arguing and finish your damnable report.”

Connor choked on his coffee, and Abby slapped him on the back, providing a perfect distraction and allowing Cutter to return to the subject without loss of face.

“He woke up. Told me he was a clone, that Helen had ‘grown him in a vat or something’, that he had no idea how she’d done it. He has Stephen's memories. I brought him here to have him taken care of.” He shrugged. “That’s all I know right now. He wasn’t in any condition to have a protracted conversation.”

“All right.” Lester tapped his pen on the pad in front of him. “For the moment, he stays here. Captain Ryan, you will make sure he’s kept under watch.” When Cutter started to object, Lester stopped him with a word. “No. Professor Cutter, we will take all sensible precautions. He is not going to be dumped into a cell, he is not going to be experimented on in the laboratory. . .” 

Abby squeaked and clapped her hand over her mouth. 

Lester sent her a raised eyebrow leavened by a half-smile and continued, “. . . and he will be under medical care until he is well.”

Cutter subsided. “All right, then. May I go and see him now?” he asked, so politely it was a veiled insult.

Much as Cutter hated to admit it, Lester won on points. “Yes, Professor, you may,” he replied, absolutely seriously.

Eyes narrowed, Cutter strode from the room, muttering imprecations. 

xXx

Abby and Connor looked at each other, then at Ryan and Lyle, and finally at Lester. “Um,” Connor said uncomfortably.

The civil servant simply raised an eyebrow again, and looked significantly at the door. The two young team members practically scampered out. Lyle grinned and followed.

Which left Ryan to ask, “Any other orders, sir?”

Lester chuckled. “No, I don’t think so, Captain. Thank you for asking, though.”

Ryan echoed his subordinate’s grin and sauntered out, heading for the infirmary a bit slower than either Cutter or the two youngsters. He was looking forward to Ditzy’s report, not only on Hart, but on Finn and Kermit, as well. 

It turned out that neither man had been too badly injured, though Kermit would be hobbling for a while on his sprained ankle. Finn had woken up a few minutes ago, a mild concussion giving him what he referred to as a brachiosaur-sized headache; then he’d groaned, and asked them to knock him out again ‘cos he’d obviously been infected by Connor’s dino-fanaticism.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stephen tells his story.

Hearing returned first. The bleeping of electronics and the quiet murmur of voices in the distance tickled Stephen’s eardrums. Smell came next. The acrid scent of antiseptics and other unidentifiable chemicals made him want to sneeze. After that, feeling followed: the ache of overtaxed muscles; the grinding pangs of an empty stomach; the dull thump of a dehydration headache, not as harsh now as it was before this place and the needle he could feel pushing coolness into the back of his hand. Sight was last, maybe because he didn't really want to see where he was. 

A voice sounded in his ear, amusement clear. “I know you're awake. Your breathing changed.” 

The r’s rolled around the room and came to rest in his heart. He opened his eyes. Nick Cutter sat beside him, a slight smile on his face, although the underlying worry was clear. 

"How long have you been there?" Stephen asked, attempting with only moderate success to sit up straighter. 

Cutter reached forward and stuffed a pillow behind him, smile widening. "Not long."

"Thanks." Stephen tentatively returned the smile. "Have they decided what they're going to do with me?"

Cutter’s smile flipped upside down into a frown and he leaned back in his chair. "Not yet," he said. "For now, you're simply to get better. Once you're strong enough to hold your own in a conversation, then they'll want to meet with you."

"In other words, you're not going to let them take advantage of my weakness," Stephen said softly. "Thank you."

Cutter flushed a delicate pink. One thing that seemingly hadn't changed was his inability to handle talking about anything even remotely connected to feelings. However, he managed to surprise Stephen when he visibly braced himself and said, "Aye lad. There's not much I wouldn't do for you."

"I still don't understand why -" Stephen was trying to play catch-up and not doing very well at it. 

"Because I've decided that we were both kind of stupid, and we both paid for it. You with death, and me with facing a lonely life of regret. And I think that now, finally, we can both drop the past and meet the future together." 

Stephen closed his eyes to hide the tears starting to fill them. "Just like that?"

"Just like that," Cutter affirmed.

"I'm not really him," Stephen whispered almost inaudibly. 

"In every way that matters, you are," Cutter replied firmly, placing his hand over Stephen's. "And I'll keep telling you that as long as I need to for you to believe me." He pulled in a deep breath. "It wasn’t until I lost you forever that I realised something. When Helen told us that you two had. . . I was stunned. And furious. But it took me a while to admit even to myself that I was angrier that she had slept with you than I was that you had slept with her."

Stephen stared down at their hands, together on the thin blanket. 

"Stephen, look at me, please."

The younger man tentatively raised his eyes.

Cutter finished quietly, "I kept on being pissed off at you because it was easier to do that than to admit that I'd fallen in love with another man, and my best friend at that."

Stephen went white. Eyes wide, he started to stutter. "Wha? But - how - why - when?" 

Stephen wondered, as his thoughts freewheeled, whether he'd ever be able to mesh the gears in his brain into forward again. If his mind were a car he'd say the transmission was totally knackered, time for a new one. Taking a deep breath, he started to concentrate on his heartbeat in an attempt to focus. That was a mistake, since his pulse seemed to have ratcheted up to about 120. He wasn’t sure what his blood pressure was, but if it was being monitored the med staff was going to show up any second, paddles in hand and ready to shock him back to life.

Cutter laughed. “I suppose total incoherence is much better than an attempt to thump me. I take it you weren't expecting that?"

After a few more gasps, Stephen managed to choke out, "Uh, no, not at all." He was doing his best to come to terms with the fact that he hadn’t been the only one keeping secrets. "You never let on."

"No, I didn't," Cutter confessed. "I had your friendship, and that was enough; besides, without knowing what had happened to Helen, I just didn't feel right moving on." He smirked. "You may have noticed over the years that I'm just a bit of a stick-in-the-mud about personal relationships."

Stephen chuckled. "Yeah, just a little." He started to twit Cutter about 'secrets' then decided to let sleeping dogs lie. They'd both kept things back, and since Cutter had proven that he had truly forgiven Stephen for his much more egregious secret, then he could silently forgive his friend for the secret in return. He smiled with total openness and gripped Cutter's hand hard.

Letting out a deeply relieved-sounding sigh, Cutter returned the pressure. Uncharacteristically tentative, he whispered, "And so? Do you think you could? I know it's awfully quick and I won't push, but. . ."

"Yes. Christ, yes." Stephen hadn’t had to think about it for long. He could almost physically feel the maelstrom of thoughts spinning around in his head as his memories came rushing back, rearranging into new patterns, incorporating this new knowledge into the fabric of the past. Stephen had never been involved with a man before, and he was having a little trouble processing his own feelings. All those years and he'd never realised exactly why he'd stuck around. 

Cutter closed his eyes and brought Stephen's hand to his lips. “I haven’t been with a man myself since my own university days, but this feels more right than anything ever has before,” he whispered. "So, thank you, Stephen Hart. I love you."

"I love you, too, you crotchety bugger," Stephen replied, and was surprised at how easy it was to say the words. Then he laughed at the mock outrage on Cutter's face. Maybe they could actually make this work. 

"How very affecting." 

The slightly snide tone in Lester's voice put Cutter's back up immediately and he started to reply in kind, but Stephen caught him up before he could speak and with a quick tweak of his fingers, coaxed Cutter into settling back down again. 

Stephen stared directly into Lester's eyes. "Please don't," he said quietly. "This is difficult enough for all concerned without you adding provocation."

Lester's eyebrows made a break for his hairline as he glanced down at their still twined hands. 

Stephen could almost see Lester’s thought processes playing out on his normally impassive face: 1. The old Stephen Hart would never have responded like that. 2. The old Stephen Hart hadn't had someone willing to back him to the edge of forever. 3. Based on Cutter’s reaction to Stephen’s hint, this Stephen does have that. 4. Anything that could put a lid on Cutter's worst excesses would make my job easier. 5. Anything that makes my job easier is to be encouraged. 6. Outcome: gift them with approval, or at least as much as would be consistent with my position and reputation. 

Stephen had to stifle a grin when Lester’s next words, spoken with a tight smile, confirmed his guesses.

"I’m pleased to see you’ve returned, Dr. Hart, and that you are obviously well enough to have a little conversation with us. Doctor Morgan says that after a light meal, you should be sufficiently recovered for questioning."

He raised his hand to forestall the explosion Cutter’s indrawn breath threatened to release. "Don't worry, Professor. There are no plans for thumbscrews. We’ll meet in the small conference room in one hour. Someone will be down before then with some decent clothing." 

After one final sweeping glance from the hospital gown Stephen was currently wearing to the pile of tattered clothes on the chair in the corner, Lester turned and sauntered out.

"That man drives me mad!" Cutter exclaimed. 

Stephen chuckled tiredly. "Only because you always rise to the bait. Instead of exploding, if you'd just give that disgusted Scottish snort you do so well, he'd back off some." He thought about it for a moment and added. "Not a lot, but some, anyway."

Cutter joined in with his amusement, his chuckle sounding slightly reluctant. "Yeah, okay. I get it. Don't feed the animals." 

"Exactly." 

Stephen turned his head to look Cutter directly in the eyes, a half-smile on his face, and met a gaze from Cutter that was softer than he had ever seen. Stephen almost lost himself in the pale blue before an amused throat-clearing beside him jerked him back to reality.

"Food," Ditzy said, clearly pleased by the sappy display he’d just witnessed, and just as clearly holding his mirth in with difficulty. Stephen had the distinct impression that the normally-sarcastic medic was looking at them like a mother hen with two slightly wayward chicks.

"And just to show you how kind I can be, I brought enough for two." Ditzy put the tray down on the table beside the bed, graced both men with an approving smile, received two blushes in return, and walked out whistling. 

Stephen had a nasty feeling that bets had been laid between the soldiers on how long it would take for him and Cutter to get together, and when he met Cutter’s gaze, he saw the other man wondering uncomfortably just how transparent they had been.

xXx

An hour later, fed and decently clothed, Stephen took a deep breath, nodded at Cutter, and they entered the conference room side by side. Looking around, Stephen saw that the entire team was present: Abby and Connor looking both excited and worried, Ryan wearing his best blank expression, Jenny Lewis appearing surprisingly flustered, Ditzy with a slight smile, and Lester his usual superior self. Par for the course.

There were two empty chairs together at the end. They sat. And waited. When Stephen began to fidget under everyone’s stares, Lester quirked a little smile. 

“Lieutenant Owen, your report, please?”

Ditzy grinned. “Right. Meet Stephen Hart, 32 years old, no scars, fairly good condition, slightly malnourished but otherwise healthy.”

“And just what does that mean?” Abby asked in a small voice. She looked at Stephen, her expression betraying her uncertainty. “Does that mean we really have Stephen back?”

“Yes,” the medic replied firmly. “However Helen Cutter managed to do it, she has re-created Stephen Hart genetically, physically and seemingly mentally and emotionally, as well.” He gazed at Lester with an over-to-you expression. “We ran some basic psych tests, and found no obvious triggers that would pose any danger.”

“Very well,” Lester responded. 

Stephen watched Captain Ryan and Jenny relax a fraction, and felt Cutter let out his pent breath.

The civil servant continued, gazing at Stephen. “Can you tell us how Helen Cutter did this, and what she plans - or planned - to do with you?” 

Folding his hands on the table in front of him when he’d much rather be holding Cutter’s hand for strength, Stephen took another deep breath and began talking.

“Okay. Um, she created me in her laboratory.” He gave a quick glance around the room. “Here’s what I know: she’d been working on cloning for quite a while; I don’t know how long. On one of her anomaly hops, she stumbled onto a genetics laboratory in the future - it had been abandoned, along with an entire scientific complex, but it was fully functional, with basic information and instructions on how to run the stuff in it. I think it was part of some last-resort colony or something.”

“Good Lord,” Cutter said softly.

“Yeah,” Stephen agreed. “And being Helen, she took advantage of the opportunity. I don’t know how she did it, or how long it took, but she moved the genetics equipment piece by piece to another place. Again, I have no idea where exactly; it was future somewhen, but there are no people except the ones she brought in to work, and no creatures that I ever saw.”

“Why,” Ryan asked. “Why move it if it was abandoned?”

“I’m not sure. Maybe she wasn’t positive they might not come back. Maybe she was just being Helen. Anyway, it ran on solar, so she had no worries about power. She got all the equipment moved, brought in some scientists from various eras, and started researching. ”

He hesitated, shifting in his chair as he tried to find the right words to set the scene; he’d never been much of a talker outside a classroom. “They were having a lot of trouble interpreting some of the details. It looked as if the process required some basic knowledge they didn’t have. At first, she could only create blank slates; she had to teach them everything. And I mean everything. That took too long. So she started experimenting with ways of implanting knowledge as the clone was being ‘grown’.”

Ditzy interrupted, “Any idea how that was done?”

Stephen shook his head. “No. She never explained any of the equipment to me. Most of what I’m telling you now I learned from overhearing conversations between her and some of the people she had working there, and a few of the times she talked to me before. . .” He sighed. “I’ll get to that in a minute. Anyway, the implantation sort of worked, but never as effectively as she wanted.”

Looking around, he spoke slowly. “That’s how she made the Cleaner clones - they were all good for certain purposes, but useless outside their ‘programming’. That still wasn’t what she wanted. She wanted someone who would be able to function without orders, someone who could act, and react, perfectly normally, but she also wanted to be able to control him. Nothing she tried worked completely . . . until she made me.”

So far, so good. Ditzy looked thoughtful, at least. The others looked more shocked than anything else. Even Lester’s eyes were a bit wider than normal. 

He shivered. “I think I was a bit of a surprise even for her. The Cleaners were made from regular tissue samples she took from her template. I - I was made from brain tissue.”

Cutter made a strangled noise, and Abby and Connor looked sick. 

Stephen looked down and noticed his hands were trembling as they lay on the table. He pressed them flat to stop the shaking, and smiled when Cutter added the weight of his own hand for comfort. 

He spoke the next words to Cutter. “When I woke up, I had all the memories of the original. I think. . .” He hesitated. “I think maybe the machinery was initially designed to ‘rebuild’ people who had been injured horrifically, and her use was a manipulation. . . a twisting . . . of its healing function.” 

“Bloody hell,” Ditzy interjected. “Where is this lab?”

“Like I said, I honestly have no idea. I anomaly-hopped to the point that there is no way I could ever find my way back again." Shrugging, Stephen went on, "Anyway, she had most of what she wanted - a fully functioning me, but she missed out on the last bit. She couldn’t control me.”

He grinned sheepishly. “I wasn’t quite quick enough to hide my doubts, though; I did manage to cover well enough to make her unsure whether she’d actually seen some rebellion, but she still didn’t quite trust me. After a couple of days, she tested me. I failed.” He hesitated, then decided not to go there right now. “Doesn’t matter how. She tried to kill me and I grabbed an anomaly detector and ran.” He squeezed Cutter’s hand to stop the explosion he knew would be coming.

Abby squeaked, horrified. 

Stephen smiled over at her. “I was lucky; the anomaly she always used for access to that place would come and go as regular as clockwork, and I made it through with seconds to spare before it closed for the night. It led to a junction, and I just kept going. It took a couple of weeks of crossing my fingers, anomaly-hopping and searching for the next one, but I finally stumbled onto the anomaly in the New Forest - and made it out about ten minutes before the team arrived.”

Lester spoke and Stephen knew this was the ultimate question, for them. “Why didn’t you contact us?”

He scratched the needle mark on the back of his hand and leaned back with a sigh. “Helen had told me right at the beginning that you’d started hunting down the Cleaner clones and were putting them down, and that you’d do the same thing to me.” 

Ignoring Cutter’s muttered ‘fuck that’, he continued, “I know - I had no real reason to believe her, but . . . I couldn’t take the chance. I am a clone. As near as damn it to the original - all the same memories, all the same feelings. But a clone nonetheless.”

He stood up and wandered over to the side table to pour a glass of water, leaving the others to stare at each other. After gulping it down, he returned to his seat and waited for the verdict.

Connor’s comment was the first. “Wow.” 

Followed immediately by Abby, who plunked her chin on her fist, grinned at Lester and asked impishly, “He followed us home; can we keep him?”

Ryan’s stifled snort and Ditzy’s much more open chuckle gave Lester the opening he needed. “Barring negative results from a few more tests. . .” He raised an eyebrow at the soldiers. “. . . I see no reason why not.”

Stephen kicked Cutter’s leg under the table. He was starting to get concerned at the number of times the older man seemed to be holding his breath. 

Starting to breathe again, Cutter asked the next question, “How do we ‘officially’ bring Stephen back to life? He’s been dead for two months!” 

Everyone looked over at Jenny, who was frowning down at her notepad. 

“Well, since there was really no body to work with, we can make a case for disappearance rather than death,” she said tentatively.

Stephen grinned at the squicked expressions on the faces of his old team. “It’s okay,” he said cheerfully. “I don’t mind.” His face fell a little. “I do remember the cage room, and it gives me the cold shivers, but it is over, and I’m here. . .” He cheered up again. “. . . So mentions of my ‘death’ don’t really bother me.” 

Abby shuddered theatrically and Connor echoed her action as she said, “Okay, whatever you say, but it still makes me ill to think about.”

“Me, too,” Cutter muttered, clutching Stephen's hand. Stephen turned his palm to grasp Cutter's hand in return.

At Abby’s dropped jaw and wide eyes, Stephen smiled at her, and then when Connor followed her gaze and did the same thing as the girl, Stephen couldn’t hold back the chuckle. He nodded at them both. “The answer is yes.” But he added a stern caution to the young man, “If you take the piss, I will have revenge.”

Connor’s eyes widened even more and he swallowed hard. Nodding, he squeaked, “No problem, mate, no piss here, none.”

Ditzy and Ryan traded a grin, and Stephen sighed. “Just great.” He squeezed Cutter’s hand as a warning and asked the soldiers, “Who won the bet?”

Lester stood abruptly and headed for the door. “Do hold off answering that question until I’m out of the room. I have no desire to be publicly informed that my Special Forces team is making wagers on official time.” He stopped at the door and glanced back at Stephen. “Dr. Hart, welcome home.” With total dignity, he swept from the room, leaving a quiet celebration behind.

“Again I ask,” Stephen raised his voice. “Who bloody won?”

Abby and Connor shrugged in confusion at each other as Ditzy laughed. “I did.”

Ryan smirked. “I missed by an afternoon. I thought it would take until this evening.” He joined Ditzy’s laughter as they moved to the exit. “Lyle’s the one who’s pissed off. He was the farthest out so he owes everyone a beer. He figured you were both too stubborn to get together until at least tomorrow evening.”

Ditzy stuck his head back through the door for one last comment. “Dr. Hart, infirmary tomorrow morning for some more lovely tests. Until then, rest-room four is yours.” 

He winked and disappeared, leaving Abby and Connor to turn on Stephen and Cutter with slightly bemused congratulations.

Stephen hugged both of them happily, lifting Abby from the ground and swinging her in a circle, to her vociferous complaints and complementary laughter. Connor got a squeeze that made him yelp. 

Stephen released Connor with a chuckle, and the young man ostentatiously rubbed his ribs. 

“You got your strength back quickly,” Connor grumbled, making a face at Stephen.

“Yeah, sorry,” Stephen replied, not exactly remorseful.

Abby grinned at Stephen and Cutter, happiness radiating from her like neon signs in the dark. “So, you’ve made up, then? You’re together?”

“Yes, and yes,” Cutter said. “We both realised that we’ve been idiots, and having been handed a second chance on a platter, we’re not going to turn it down.”

Connor snickered. “I’ll bet Helen won’t be pleased about that.” At the sudden silence, he gulped and looked around guiltily, eyes wide.

Cutter’s shocked expression melted into the most open mirth anyone in the room had ever heard from him. The scientist was laughing so hard he had to lean on the edge of the table to avoid falling down.

“Bloody hell, you’re right,” Stephen gasped, wiping the tears of merriment from his own eyes. “I don’t think this outcome was anywhere in her plans.”

Jenny smiled from the corner where she’d taken refuge as the celebration began. “I don’t think it was in anyone’s plans,” she said quietly as she moved back to the middle of the room. “But it is truly a wondrous blessing.” She rose onto tiptoes to kiss Stephen's cheek. “Welcome home, Stephen. I’ll start on restoring your identity first thing tomorrow. As soon as I have some progress, we’ll meet to work on the cover story. Until then, you’ll have to stay here.”

Cutter started to object, but she cut him off. “No, Cutter, we need to do this sensibly. Helen is still out there, remember? If anything happens before he’s officially resurrected, we have no remedy against her.”

Stephen shivered. “She’s right, Cutter.” He hugged the scientist tightly and spoke softly in his ear. “I take no chances with us right now.” He pulled back a little to look the older man in the eye. “I’m not ashamed to admit she scares the shit out of me. She already tried to kill me once, and I believe she wouldn’t think twice about trying it again if she thought she could get away with it. I’m pretty sure she considers me to be nothing but a piece of property, her property, to do with as she wishes.”

Nodding reluctantly, Cutter gave in. “Yeah, okay,” he said. Then he added, “But I stay too. I’m not leaving you alone.”

“Thanks,” Stephen said. He hesitated, gave an evil little grin, and kissed Cutter swiftly. 

It was little more than a quick peck, but it left the scientist blushing a bit as he looked around the room, only to raise his eyebrows as he saw that the room was empty except for them. 

“They left when I hugged you,” Stephen said with amusement. “I think they wanted to give us a little time alone.”

“I’m all for that,” Cutter responded happily. “I’m all for that.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nick and Stephen get together

As he scrubbed his head with the towel, Cutter could see Stephen smiling as he lay on the lower bunk, watching him through the bathroom door. 

Cutter caught his eye and dropped the towel onto the counter, leaving his hair standing up in spikes that were more shocked looking than surprised. “What?” he asked, exasperated. “What is it about my hair that amuses you so?”

“All those years I needed gel to make mine work, but all you have to do is rub and yours stands up. It’s not fair.” Running his hands through his own hair, Stephen stretched luxuriously. “God, it feels so good to lie down on a real bed.”

Stunned by the ‘rub and yours stands up’ statement, wondering if it was a deliberate or accidental double entendre, Cutter stared at the long body across the room and scrabbled for something to say that wouldn’t embarrass him horribly. After a moment, when Stephen started to smirk, he managed to bring his brain on-line again. “I . . . ahem . . . I guess you’ve been sleeping rough?” Cutter knew he had an unfortunate tendency to be susceptible to risqué innuendos, and he was starting to wonder if the other man might start taking unfair advantage of that.

But then Stephen left the humour behind. “Yeah. Bridges, abandoned buildings, a few nights in homeless camps trading assistance for warmth.” At Cutter’s concerned look, he shook his head. “No, there weren’t any problems; I was still a bit stronger than most of them, and I tended to be quite a bit taller, too; so I could help move things and stuff. In return, I got a warmer corner to curl up in.” He shrugged. “It worked, mostly.”

Cutter moved over and sat on the opposite bunk. “It must have been hell,” he said quietly.

Another shrug. “You know me, I do what I need to do.” Stephen didn’t look like he cared much; it was over and done with. “Remember Bolivia? The Ankylosaur and Triceratops trackways?”

“My God, yes,” Cutter laughed. “That bloody awful ‘hotel’ we stopped at?”

“Uh-huh. And the old lady who gave us the choice of ‘assisting’ her daughters or rebuilding the outhouse?”

“And we chose the outhouse . . .” Cutter was chuckling so hard he could barely speak. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen such a disappointed pair in my life.”

Stephen grinned, rolling over to face him. “I know I haven’t. And the older one was really quite ravishing.”

“Eh, the younger one was nicer, pretty - and one bloody good cook.” Cutter shook his head. “I just didn’t feel right about it.”

“Me either.” Stephen sobered, and started picking at a loose thread on the duvet, telegraphing his sudden disquiet. “Cutter, do you really think we can make a go of this?”

“Having second thoughts?” Cutter wanted desperately to jump up, rush over, and pull Stephen into a hug, but he was terrified that he’d frighten the younger man away totally.

Stephen sat up and leaned against the wall, one leg hanging off the bed, and the other braced up to provide something to wrap his hands around as he stared at the wall over Cutter’s head. “I - I don’t think so. It’s just - oh, fuck, Cutter, I am so crap at relationships!” He lowered his gaze to look over at Cutter soberly. “Some fooling around as a student and an affair with Helen don’t exactly make me prime relationship material.”

When Cutter tensed at the name, Stephen sat up cross-legged and braced his elbows on his knees. “I can’t even mention her.” He dropped his face into his hands, the picture of despair.

Shaking his head, Cutter moved over to sit beside Stephen. He nudged the younger man until he turned to face him, and then grasped the strong chin to make the cobalt eyes meet his own. 

“It’s not that,” Cutter said. “I told you, that’s over. Done. Past. No, it’s just that I’m so angry with her for trying to remake you as a weapon rather than the gift you are, and for trying to kill you, and for trying to take you away from me again before I even knew you existed, that . . .” He hesitated. In a way, it was easier for him to leave the past behind because even though this was Stephen in face, form, mind, and seemingly spirit, this wasn't the actual body that had slept with Helen. Not that he was going to say that aloud. “Stephen, if Helen was here right now, I swear I would have no hesitation in putting a bullet into her and then handing her over to the Special Forces for interrogation.” There. If anything could convince Stephen that he meant what he said, that would. And it did.

Eyes wide, Stephen gaped at him. “Bloody hell, Cutter,” he said softly. “I thought I was the only one who wanted to shoot her.” He grinned a little. “What the two of us ever saw in that bitch, I don’t think I’ll ever know.”

Cutter laughed out loud. “Lately, I’ve been beginning to wonder about that myself.” Leaning forward, he closed in slowly enough that Stephen could back away if he wanted to. 

Stephen took a deep breath. He looked as nervous as hell. But he also looked like he wanted this as badly as Cutter. The quick peck they had shared in the conference room was nothing compared to this. When their mouths met, the strength of Stephen’s lips, the slight prickle of the stubble on his face, the taste of his mouth, all combined to act like a magnum of champagne on Cutter’s senses. When Stephen started to kiss him back, the tip of his tongue lightly seeking, Cutter moaned softly, barely a breath of sound, and Stephen opened his mouth to allow full access.

Cutter took complete advantage of that access, sweeping his tongue into Stephen's mouth, tasting, feeling, questing for places that touched the other man’s senses. When Stephen moaned again and tangled their tongues together without reserve, pressing close, hands coming up to cup the back of his head, Cutter knew he’d won. He broke the kiss to see that Stephen's eyes were closed.

The younger man’s face was empty and still lost in sensation as his tongue slipped out to sweep across his full lower lip, re-tasting the kiss. The blue eyes opened, a little blurry and a lot dilated.

“Fucking hell,” Stephen whispered. Then with a blinding smile, he added, “Can we do that again?”

Laughing, Cutter pressed him flat onto the bed and leaned down over him. “As many times as you want to,” he said happily. 

“In that case, we’re going to be here a while,” Stephen whispered, stretching up to mould their mouths together once more. 

Cutter chuckled and started a line of nibbling kisses across Stephen's strong jaw, then paused to run his tongue into the hollow under his ear, eliciting another whimper. Tracking down the long column of Stephen’s neck, he nipped at the pulse of his carotid, receiving a whine this time. Finally, he ended with sucking at the juncture of shoulder and neck; and a slightly harder bite there pulled out a groan along with a slight undulation of the slim hips.

“Fucking hell,” Stephen groaned again. “What are you doing to me?”

“Driving you crazy?” Cutter smirked. This was fun.

Stephen gave him a dirty look which melted into cross-eyed distraction when Cutter gave an evil grin in return, pushed his shirt up, and gently bit down on his left nipple. 

“Oh. Fuck.” Stephen whispered.

“Not yet,” Cutter replied softly, tracking over with tongue and teeth to give the same treatment to the right nub. Wouldn’t want either one to feel neglected, now would he? “I think that’s for another night.”

Moaning, Stephen reached out and gently stroked Cutter’s stomach. When the muscles twitched at the touch, Stephen wrapped his arms around his back, pulling him up to seal their mouths together. This time, the kiss was softer, more searching, sensual rather than passionate. 

“So, what’s for tonight?” Stephen asked rather breathlessly when they broke apart. “My trousers are way too bloody tight right now.” He squirmed. “In fact, I think I need a much looser pair for tomorrow. I wonder what happened to my cargos.”

“We binned them,” Cutter chuckled. “Here, let me help.” He reached between them and slipped the button on Stephen's trousers loose, then slowly and carefully pulled the zip down, remembering that the clothes left for Stephen to change into hadn’t included pants. 

Stephen let out a slow breath as the pressure on his erection eased. He stared into Cutter’s eyes as his cock was grasped and slowly stroked from the base to the swollen head. 

“Oh, fuck,” Stephen whispered again. Cutter was pleased to see all Stephen’s language skills seemed to have deserted him. He looked almost shattered.

Cutter quickly released his own hard cock from his trousers, moved in close and set up some diversionary tactics to keep Stephen distracted as he took the next step, kissing the younger man again as he grasped both their cocks, gently squeezing them together and stroking slowly. He had to throw his leg over Stephen's to keep them together as his lover writhed under him, totally out of control and moaning into his mouth. The sound and the feel of the hard body moving against his as he stroked them brought Cutter closer and closer to the edge. After adding a slight twist on the upstroke, he knew he couldn’t last much longer. He broke the kiss and homed in on Stephen’s neck and shoulder junction again, biting down softly as his thumb raked across the heads of their cocks, extra hard on the sensitive slit of Stephen's.

Stephen stiffened and strangled a shout, every muscle in his body going rigid as his cock pulsed in Cutter’s hand, spurting ropes of semen across their bellies. The sound and feeling tripped Cutter’s climax and his come mixed with Stephen's.

“Guh,” was all Stephen could manage as Cutter collapsed over him, panting.

Cutter’s head seemed to weigh about three times normal, but he managed to lift it up long enough to press a gentle kiss to Stephen's lips before dropping onto the bed beside his lover.

Chuckling weakly, Stephen said, “Oh, wow.” He lifted his head slightly to look down their bodies. “But I’m afraid they’re really going to have to find me some fresh clothes for tomorrow. These are a bit yucky now. . .”

Cutter joined in the mirth. “Aye, mine too. Oh well, not to worry. As long as you enjoyed it as much as I did.” Bracing his head on his hand, he batted his eyelids at Stephen, who was nodding heartily. “So, you feel up to getting a flannel to clean us?”

Stephen’s head stilled and he frowned. “Can’t it wait? I’m tired,” he said plaintively, adding some puppy-dog eyes for good measure. 

Cutter’s lack of resistance to those was well-known to the entire team, including Cutter himself. He hardened his heart. “Uh-uh. You know when it dries it’s like glue.”

Stephen pouted at the failure. “Right.” He gave Cutter a look that just missed being dirty by being a little too sappy. “So that’s why you made sure I ended up on the outside.”

Cutter snickered. “Planning. Superb planning.” He spoiled the effect, however, by yawning prodigiously as he squirmed out of his clothes and leaned over Stephen to drop them beside the bed. 

Stephen smiled and kissed him. “Right. One warm flannel coming up.” Standing up, he staggered a bit before he made his way into the toilet, to return quickly with a flannel. He cleaned them both and dropped the cloth on top of Cutter’s discarded clothing, ignoring Cutter’s objection.

After dropping his own trousers and shirt onto the pile, he slipped back into the bed, this time on the inside. Resting his head on Cutter’s shoulder, he whispered, “Thank you.”

Cutter pressed a gentle kiss to his temple and replied, “You’re welcome. Glad to be of service.”

Stephen chuckled, yawned himself, and fell asleep like a light switch being flicked. Cutter followed almost immediately.

They’d been sleeping no more than two hours when a twitch of Stephen's head on his shoulder woke Cutter abruptly. He remained as still as he could while his brain rebooted and came back online. Once he was fully tracking, he slowly turned his head to look at his lover. 

Stephen was breathing quickly and shallowly, almost panting, and every few moments his entire body jerked as if he’d touched a live wire. Now that Cutter was awake, he could hear tiny, muffled whimpers coming from the younger man’s throat as the nightmare he was obviously suffering through continued unrelentingly. 

Cutter could barely make out an occasional soft word amongst the pained, lost sounds. “Please”, and “no”, and “oh god” were the ones that sank their own claws into his heart. Dear Lord, what must it be like to relive your own death in nightmares? Cutter took a deep breath and began to gently stroke the sweating body pressed against him.

“Shh,” he whispered. “Come on back, Stephen. It’s over. Shh.” Repeating the words over and over again, sliding his hand up and down the tight back, he felt Stephen gradually start to surface from the nightmare of memory.

After a few minutes, the muscles in the long body loosened, and Stephen finally started taking a few deeper breaths. The words he was murmuring became so soft that Cutter couldn’t make them out, until Stephen breathed, “Love you”, and relaxed completely back into sleep. Cutter pressed a kiss to the forehead nestled into his shoulder and allowed himself to drop off again. They could talk in the morning. Right now, they both needed rest.

xXx

Stephen yawned as he peeled himself off of Cutter. Wow, he hadn’t realised how quickly he’d returned to being a limpet. None of his other lovers had appreciated a six foot two male body wrapped around them, so he’d got used to turning his back and hugging a pillow instead of the person he’d just been with. It was rather nice to be in bed with someone who obviously didn’t mind being cuddled.

Now that he’d been released, Cutter stretched and opened his eyes. “Good morning,” he said with a knowing smile.

“Good morning back to you,” Stephen replied, blushing a bit. His dawn hard-on had probably been fairly obvious, considering how closely he’d been plastered to Cutter’s side. The blush turned into a grumble when Cutter snickered at him, until the older man sat up and kissed him hard, ignoring his weak “morning breath” protestations.

“We’ve been sharing tents and even sleeping bags for years,” Cutter said as he surfaced. “Not a worry for me.” 

Still a little cross-eyed, Stephen nodded weakly. “Okay. Um. Good.” He scrubbed his scalp. “I really, really need a slash. And a shower.” 

Cutter lay back down with a chuckle. “Be my guest,” he said. “I’m going to stay right here until you’re done. Then I’ll get up.”

Crawling over him as slowly as possible, Stephen smirked when Cutter shivered at the contact. 

“Right,” Stephen said. “I’ll be back in a few.” He stood up and walked slowly into the bathroom, making sure Cutter got a very good look. At everything. A quick glance over his shoulder as he started to push the door to showed him a slightly pink face and narrow blue eyes. He blew a quick kiss at Cutter as he closed the door, and heard the Scotsman laugh with delight.

Stephen wandered back out wrapped in a towel fifteen minutes later, washed, brushed and clean-shaven. It felt good. The quick shower he’d taken the night before had been nice, but he’d still felt that a good scrubbing was a necessity this morning; especially since the leftovers from their ‘activities’ hadn’t magically disappeared overnight. When Cutter described it as ‘glue’ he hadn’t been wrong. 

Cutter was still lying in bed, sprawled on his back under the duvet; he’d actually fallen asleep again. Stephen wavered between waking him up and watching him sleep for a few minutes. He hadn’t had a chance to really see Cutter since he’d returned, without the older man being aware of the scrutiny. He looked about ten years younger when asleep, the lines of worry and stress smoothed.

Momentarily distracted by the new pile of clothes that had magically appeared on the table while he was cleaning up, Stephen headed over to poke through it for something to wear. He grinned. At least they’d remembered the pants this time, though going by the sizes on the tags, the trousers might be a little snug. On both him and Cutter. Maybe the girls were having a little fun? Or maybe they were giving the guys a chance to ogle without penalty, since both Abby and Jenny were too observant to have made such a mistake. Especially since the length on both pairs of trousers was exactly right. . .

He stroked the soft material of the shirts, lost in thought. So lost that he jumped when Cutter spoke.

“Having fun?” the older man asked with a grin.

Stephen chuckled. “Lovely material on the shirts. Very soft.” He pulled out the longer one and slowly drew it over his head, making sure he gave Cutter a very good look before covering each centimetre of skin. When his face finally broke through the neck opening, he had a hard time not teasing Cutter about his expression. The man looked like he couldn’t decide whether to swear or start pleading.

The normally light blue eyes were dark with desire. “Now, that was totally unfair,” Cutter complained. “You’re going to give me a coronary. ‘Sexual frustration’ would not be a good cause of death for my obit.”

Quickly dropping the towel and pulling on pants and trousers, Stephen strode over to the bed and kissed Cutter hard. The scientist gave a grunt and then swept his tongue into Stephen's mouth, claiming him again. Stephen lost his ability to breathe, and moaned softly. Damn, damn, damn; how the fucking hell could a simple kiss do this to him? He broke away and gasped in a lungful of air, leaning his forehead onto Cutter’s.

“My god,” he whispered. “I still can’t believe what you do to me.” With a sudden grin, he stood up, yanked the sheet off of the protesting Cutter, and pulled him to his feet. “Shower, now,” he ordered. “I’m starving, and if we don’t head out this moment, we won’t head out at all.”

Cutter laughed and obeyed, heading for the bathroom. “But we’re coming back after we eat, right?” 

“Guaranteed,” Stephen replied. Then he remembered and groaned. “Crap. I have to go to the infirmary for a while; some more blood tests or something - before food. Damn.”

Cutter made a quick about-face, crossed the room in four steps, and proceeded to kiss Stephen senseless. “We have plenty of time,” he whispered.

Stephen did his best to uncross his eyes and start breathing again. “Uh, right,” he muttered, still befuddled. Wow. Who knew Professor Nick Cutter could actually kiss like a god?

Cutter laughed, and Stephen cringed internally. Oh shit, had he actually said that out loud? Obviously, he had, as Cutter proceeded to do it again and then disappear into the shower while Stephen was still trying to collect his scattered thoughts. He had a vague idea that one of the missing ones had taken refuge under the bed. Then he realised that was a very strange notion to be having, so he gave up and just sat down to wait for Cutter’s return.

xXx

Nick Cutter was not the most patient of men. Even he was willing to admit that; well, he’d admit it after a suitable infusion of scotch, anyway. But for once, he was hoping that it would be a while before Stephen returned from the bowels of the infirmary where the doctors had led him, grumbling unhappily about needles and the various other indignities to which he was about to be subjected.

Two minutes after they left, Cutter went in search of Lieutenant Owen. Ditzy was just about the only person Cutter trusted enough to talk to about the events of the night before. Nightmares weren’t exactly the academic’s area of expertise. He’d had a few in his life, after Helen disappeared, and even more after losing Stephen, but they were all nightmares about someone else, about memories and thoughts and hopes and fears. He had no idea how to deal with Stephen's nightmares of his own actual death.

xXx

Ditzy looked up from the wrist he was bandaging to see Cutter wavering in the doorway. He nodded once and motioned for Cutter to wait for him in his office. When the Scotsman disappeared, Ditzy finished up his work, added a few pithy remarks to his patient about the soldier’s lack of both balance and reflexes in unarmed combat, and headed after Cutter.

The medic had already seen that Cutter was worried about something. The quick glance in the doorway had been enough for that. He took a bit longer to examine the man as he entered the room and moved across to his desk.

Cutter was fidgeting with anything he could get his hands on, and his lips were pursed tightly.

Ditzy sat down, leaned forward and took the letter opener from Cutter’s grasp. The man didn’t look as if he should be holding sharp objects. “What’s on your mind, Professor?” he asked.

Cutter made an aborted move to snatch the letter opener back, then took a deep breath and sat back in his chair, folding his hands in his lap. “Stephen woke me up last night,” he said without preamble. “He was having a nightmare. From the sound of it, it was the cage room.” 

Raising his eyebrows, Ditzy said, “Okay. Not surprising, really. Did he wake up? Or did it go away on its own?”

“Neither one,” Cutter replied. “I held on, stroked his back, and whispered to him until he relaxed.”

“Best thing to do,” Ditzy said, wondering, in that case, what the problem was. “So, why are you here?”

Cutter started fidgeting again. “Ah, bugger, I’m not even sure myself.” He ran his hands through his hair, mussing it badly. “I wanted to ask . . . to ask you what I should do.”

Ditzy suppressed his amusement at how tentative the professor was being. For Cutter to even think of asking for help meant he was totally lost. And totally lost and Professor Cutter didn’t mix happily. It was definitely time for directness; the professor was in no shape to handle even the slightest tinge of sarcasm.

“Okay. Three things.” He held up a finger. “One, you can ignore it and hope that it was a one-off, as it might have been.” He held up a second. “Two, if it wasn’t just a one-off, you can hope that the nightmares might taper off by themselves. In that case, once Stephen becomes more secure, they should diminish. Three. . .” He held up a third digit. “. . . It could just keep going on. That is the most likely scenario. After all, he’s probably been having them fairly frequently since he was reborn.”

Nodding, Cutter agreed. “Yeah, I think you’re right on that one. It sounded like a well-worn record.”

Ditzy was old enough to remember vinyl from his childhood. “So, if it seems like he’s stuck in a groove on this, then you’ll have to talk to him about it.”

Cutter made a face. “Bloody hell, I was afraid you were going to say that. How do I even bring it up?”

Ditzy leaned back again and considered, rubbing his lower lip thoughtfully. Neither Cutter nor Hart were the most articulate of men when talking about feelings; or anything outside their areas of expertise, actually. Ah, area of expertise: that’s the opening. 

“Here’s what you can do,” he said. “Treat it like a scientific puzzle.” At Cutter’s look of confusion, he grinned. “Neither one of you do well with emotional speeches,” he said, grin widening at Cutter’s half-outraged, half-assenting expression. “So, you bring it up, quietly tell him what happened, and then between you, you go through the memory and basically exorcise it by bringing it into the light.”

Both Cutter’s expression and his body-language screamed unhappiness at the idea. His voice wasn’t as loud, but it was in total accord with the expression and body. “That’s not going to be any fun. For either one of us.”

Ditzy nodded. “Very true. And it’s not going to be magic, either. It will take a while to have an effect, but most of the time, talking through a terrible experience - with someone who doesn’t judge it,” he emphasised, “will help a lot.”

Sighing, Cutter scrubbed his scalp again and practically pleading, he asked, “So, he wouldn’t be better off talking to you?”

Chuckling, Ditzy leaned forward and patted Cutter’s forearm. “I’ll be willing to act as back-up,” he said cheerfully. “But for the sake of your partnership, you really should be running the show on this one. He needs to know that he can talk to you about things that bother him.”

Cutter’s face cleared and he nodded. “Ah. Yes. I see. Even if it doesn’t help, if he can tell me without me flying up into the boughs, then he’ll trust me not to throw him away like I did last time.” 

That statement surprised the medic more than anything else that had been said in the meeting. Cutter openly admitting his faults in his prior relationship with Stephen was a very long stride in the right direction. 

“Exactly,” Ditzy said. “Now, Stephen should be getting through with the poke-and-prod committee in just a few minutes. Go, grab some sandwiches or something and take him out into the courtyard. Feed him, then talk.” The emphasis was laid clearly on the last word. He stood up and clasped Cutter’s shoulder. “You’ll do fine. Just treat him like one of your students.”

The medic was surprised into a burst of laughter when Cutter grimaced, and grumbled as he exited, “You wouldn’t say that if you knew how I treated my students.”

Ditzy called after him, “Then sodding well treat him better than one of your students.”

Then he chuckled when a raised middle finger was the professor’s only response to that sally.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things progress nicely.

Stephen walked out of the infirmary, still feeling slightly lightheaded after the quantity of blood that had been taken from him. He’d known that doctors tended toward vampirism, but he’d never before realised just how much blood it actually took to feed the entire clan. Not to mention the other bodily fluids they’d demanded. . . And the scans they’d taken. . . And the whatever the hell it was that they’d insisted he breathe into. . .

The only thing that stopped his internal grumble-fest was the sight of Cutter waiting for him with a tray in his hands, piled high with sandwiches, water, and bless him, coffee. Stephen smiled happily as he joined the professor, planted a kiss on him and grabbed a sandwich. 

Cutter grunted. “That was supposed to wait until we get outside.”

“Sorry, too hungry.” Stephen's reply was slightly muffled through the mouthful of sandwich.

“Well, come on, then,” Cutter said, holding the tray under Stephen's nose and waving it around. “Follow the lovely food and you’ll get some more when we’re outside.”

Stephen chuckled at the phrasing, and Cutter cringed.

“Damn, not how I meant it.” Cutter was still quite obviously having trouble with double-entendres. When he saw the grin that kept playing around Stephen's mouth, he gave up entirely, snatched the tray away from Stephen's questing hand, and with a very quick kiss, pushed him through the door to the courtyard. “Outside, now. Bench in the corner.”

Eyebrows aloft, Stephen obeyed with alacrity, not sure whether he was doing so because he really was very hungry, or whether he just liked following Cutter’s orders. That thought brought his eyebrows down; it wasn’t particularly comfortable.

They managed to trample the pangs of hunger under the weight of sandwiches, coffee and about half a litre of water each. Afterwards, Stephen lay replete at the foot of the bench watching Cutter, who was half-lying, propped on one elbow on the bench above him. He could tell from the look on Cutter’s face that he had something serious he wanted to get off his chest.

xXx

Crossing his mental fingers, Cutter figured it was time to beard the lion. “Stephen,” he started out.

The younger man sat up and looked uncomfortably at Cutter, who smiled back reassuringly as he too came upright. 

“Do you remember last night?” Cutter asked.

Stephen's face was a picture of confusion. “Of course,” he said slowly. “I’d have to be totally amnesiac not to remember that. . . It was amazing.”

Cutter nodded. “Right. That’s what I thought.” He leaned forward a little and rested his forearms on his knees, hands clasped. Focussing on them, he continued, “After we fell asleep, you had a nightmare. I woke up and you were talking, and twitching. It didn’t sound as if you were having a very good time.”

Stephen flushed and hung his head. “Crap.” Running his fingers through his hair, he turned until his back was leaning against the bench. “I - I’ve had that nightmare every time I sleep. I thought, when I didn’t wake up last night that it had stopped. I - I’m sorry. I should find another place to sleep. . .”

“Bugger that,” Cutter interrupted. “We sleep together.”

“But - “

“No way do I leave you to handle that alone,” he said firmly as Stephen turned and gaped at him. “You’ve been having nightmares about the cage room?”

Stephen nodded, resting an elbow on the bench and his head on his hand. He plucked a blade of grass and spoke to it. “I relive - or redie - it every time I fall asleep.” Shivering, he continued reluctantly, “I hate it; that’s one of the reasons I’m so exhausted. I never sleep for long.”

“Would a sleeping pill help?” Cutter asked tentatively.

Shaking his head firmly, Stephen's shiver turned into a full-body shudder. “No,” he responded emphatically. “Not at all. When I snagged the tranqs from the vet I grabbed a few sedatives I knew would work for humans: isoflurane, and some diazepam, too.” He glanced guiltily at Cutter; nothing had been brought up yet about where he’d ‘liberated’ his tranqs from and Cutter was not intending to question him too deeply on such matters. When Cutter deliberately didn’t react to the revelation, Stephen relaxed a little and continued. “Yeah, they worked, but what they did was keep me asleep.” He shuddered again and leaned back to stare at the sky. “Without them, I would wake up when it got bad. With them, no such luck. I was stuck asleep through the whole thing. It was. . . Worse than torture. After that one time, I threw the rest of them away.”

“Bloody hell,” Cutter whispered. “I can see that. . . Right. No sleeping pills, then.”

Stephen looked directly at Cutter for the first time since the conversation had started. It seemed as if having Cutter accept his statements at face value, without any cavils or contradictions, was helping his sense of trust immensely and Cutter made a mental note of that for the future. 

“Honestly,” Stephen said. “It’s not as bad as it was. It happens every night, but only once, not over and over again, like it did at first.”

That emotionless statement horrified Cutter. What had Stephen been going through for the last two months? “Right,” Cutter said. “So, no sleeping pills, and it only happens once a night now. That means it’s improving, and should go away entirely at some point.”

“Yeah, at some point,” Stephen said dully. “But you can’t go without sleep, either. It wouldn’t be fair to you to have to handle that every night.”

Cutter laughed. “Bloody hell, Stephen. I’ve always been a restless sleeper; I wake up and go back to sleep two or three times a night most of the time.”

“Why didn’t I ever notice that?” Stephen asked sceptically. “We’ve shared space dozens of times over the years.”

“Because you could give a bloody log lessons in sleeping,” Cutter replied with a grin. “For someone who’ll wake up when anything the slightest bit unusual happens, once you know something’s going to occur, you can ignore the most obnoxious horrors. Remember that incredible thunderstorm in Montana - the first dig we visited?”

Stephen cast his mind back and then laughed. “Yeah, everyone at breakfast was moaning about being woken up dozens of times from the flashes and bangs; but after the first few minutes, I just slept through it. Couldn’t work out why everyone else didn’t, too.” He looked at Cutter. “But you didn’t seem like you’d had much of a problem, either.”

“Exactly. I was used to waking and sleeping again; I’d just drop off again after every bang. So, seriously. It won’t be a bother to me to work you out of it, and then go right back to sleep.”

“Well, okay.” Stephen's agreement was still a bit reluctant. “As long as you tell me if you start having a problem.”

“I promise,” Cutter said honestly. “I don’t see it happening, but I promise anyway.”

“Good. Now that’s taken care of, where to now?”

Cutter settled back down and a look of worry crossed Stephen’s face again. He was obviously waiting for the second shoe to drop, so Cutter let it fall.

“We’ve taken care of part of it,” Cutter said, looking searchingly into Stephen's eyes. “The rest of it, we’ll probably have to do in stages. But I did some research, and it seems that talking through a bad experience can help take the edge off.”

“You want me to describe being torn apart?” Stephen's horror made his voice a slightly unmanly squeak as he started to stand up. “Fuck that!”

Cutter reached out and pulled him in, holding the stiff body close until the younger man started to relax a little. “I know. It’ll be hard,” he said soothingly. “Probably on both of us. But I think you might need it.”

“But you already saw it.” Stephen's reply was rather muffled against Cutter’s shoulder, even the potential of an audience to his minor breakdown seemingly not enough to make him move away.

“Not all of it,” Cutter responded honestly. “Stephen, once you went down I couldn’t bear to watch any more. I collapsed myself.”

“So what makes you think you can handle this?” Stephen's voice was less muffled as he moved away to look at Cutter, but the words were almost inaudible.

Doing Stephen the honour of actually thinking before he spoke, Cutter answered slowly, “Because we both need it. You need to exorcise the pain and terror, and I need to exorcise the horror and guilt.”

“Guilt? What do you have to be guilty about? It was my choice.” Stephen’s manner was utterly shocked.

“Yeah, okay. It was your choice, but I should have realised you’d make that choice, and I should have ducked faster!” His voice lowered. “Stephen, no one here is expendable. We’re all desperately needed. You’re desperately needed. By the team; and by me.” 

Stephen stared at him. It seemed that never in his wildest thoughts had he considered that Cutter would feel that way. “Oh,” he said in a tiny voice. “I guess we do both have some stuff to work through.”

Cutter grinned. “That we do. We’ll talk tonight, okay?”

His own answering smile turning a bit lascivious, Stephen started to say, “After we have some fun f - ”

The ADD went off with a howl. Cutter kissed him hard and took off like a scalded cat, leaving Stephen with a tray full of empty wrappers and a very nervous expression on his face.

xXx

Cutter strode back into the ARC five hours later, ready for a shower and some dinner. He got the shower, but Lester caught him before he managed to track Stephen down and informed him that for once, he needed to write his report right now. There was going to be a visitor from the Home Office the next day, and they had to be up to date on all paperwork. Growling, Cutter headed for his office. Presumably he could find Stephen after he finished. The tracker was probably down in the gym, anyway.

Pushing the door to his office open, he stopped short halfway through. Stephen was sitting beside his desk with the computer turned to face him, going through Connor’s creature database and making notes. Cutter stuttered a bit as Stephen smiled at him. 

Twinkling eyes shining azure in the light from the screen, Stephen said, “I thought I’d get a head start on the report for you. Save some time.”

“Oh,” Cutter responded, still playing catch-up. “Thanks. That’ll help.” He shook his head and grinned as he moved across the room. “How far have you got?” 

The familiar statement, used so many times over the years as Stephen helped Cutter with his paperwork, made them both laugh.

“Not too far,” Stephen replied. “Just some info on the creatures. I figured I’d leave the blow-by-blow for you.” He wiggled his eyebrows.

Cutter growled. “Not now, damn it. These trousers are too bloody tight already. The last thing I need is you playing with words. Or anything else.”

Stephen smiled and turned the computer over to Cutter, who sat down and started typing, still grumbling. As he worked, filling out the required forms and typing up the necessary paragraphs, Stephen hung over his shoulder, whispering corrections in his ear that would allow non-scientists to understand some of the statements. Making the suggested improvements, Cutter sighed happily. He’d forgotten how comforting it had been to have the younger man so closely allied with him. Stephen obviously felt the same way, based on the weight of his chin on Cutter’s shoulder, and the arm draped across the professor’s back as he pointed out another too-technical phrasing.

“How can you translate this stuff so easily?” Cutter asked, pretending to be miffed.

Stephen laughed. “Because you always stuck me with teaching the first-years, of course. I got used to it.”

“Ah.” Cutter wasn’t about to go there. “Glad you had that experience, then. It’s so useful now.”

He grinned at Stephen's completely gob-smacked expression and hit ‘send’ to dispatch the report to Lester and everyone else on the cc list.

“Dinner, then home.” Cutter stood up and stretched mightily. “Curry?”

Remaining seated, Stephen sighed. “Um, not yet. I’m still not resurrected.”

“Bugger it, how long is it going to take?” Cutter was less than pleased. A few forms and it should be done as far as he was concerned.

Stephen shrugged. “Well, there are lots of different agencies involved, according to Jenny. And every one of them wants verification from all the others before they’ll do anything. It’s a bit of a mess. And since she has to go out on the anomaly shouts, it does put a crimp in her time.”

“Bugger,” Cutter repeated. “Yeah, okay, so we . . .”

Stephen interrupted. “Can we send Connor out for curry? Invite him and Abby to join us? Just for dinner?”

Now that was an inspired idea. Cutter clapped him on the back and fished out his phone. “I’ll do that right now.”

Once he managed to get hold of Connor, the young man put a crimp in that plan. “So sorry, Professor,” Connor said. “Abby and I are going to dinner with some friends. But if you order ahead, I can grab the food for you while Abby is getting ready. Would that help?”

“Thanks, Connor, that would be great. You have enough cash?” At Connor’s assent, Cutter hung up and immediately dialled the local restaurant to make the order. “You heard?” 

“Yeah. I’m not that disappointed, actually,” Stephen said softly. “Connor and Abby are great, but I find I want you to myself as much as possible for a while.”

Cutter leaned forward and kissed him. Statements like that just had to be rewarded.

Dinner didn’t take long, neither of the men wishing to waste any time getting private. They’d barely made it into Stephen’s assigned room before they were melded together against the wall, hands wandering, teeth raking, lips and tongues tasting and soothing. They stumbled over to the bed and Stephen fell backwards, pulling Cutter over onto him so he could run his hands up and down his back, fingers bent and nails scraping through the thin material.

Cutter moaned and bit softly at Stephen’s neck, then took the reddened area between his lips and started sucking on it. Stephen cursed and fumbled at Cutter’s shirt, pulling the material out of the waistband and running his hands underneath onto bare skin. He spread his long legs and let Cutter settle between them, wrapping his calves around Cutter’s to hold him down. After a few minutes, their frantic movements slowed, and they began to test and taste each other’s responses more calmly. They were in no hurry, not any more.

Cutter toed off his shoes, then pushed Stephen’s legs farther apart so he could sit up between them and pull off his shirt; following that up with the slight contortion required in order to remove trousers, pants and socks without climbing out of bed. 

Stephen was chuckling softly by the time Cutter finished, but his amusement trickled away at the lascivious look on Cutter’s face. Cutter leaned forward and kissed him slowly and deeply, stroking every centimetre of his mouth with a questing tongue. Halfway through, Stephen was already moaning into the kiss, and by the end he was breathless. Cutter took advantage of Stephen’s limpness and pushed up his tee shirt, bunching it under his arms and exposing Stephen’s torso for him to play with. Starting at the collar bone, he began to nibble the exposed flesh, following each nip with a lap of his tongue. Trailing along the well-defined chest muscles, he sucked on the tight, erect nipples, tongue circling the hard nubs, then he let his lips and teeth make a moist trail down the taut abdominal muscles, to finish off with dipping his tongue into Stephen’s navel, eliciting a whine and a squirm.

Cutter gave a sideways grin at the totally spaced expression on Stephen’s face. Without warning, he grabbed the hem of the tee shirt and yanked it over Stephen’s head and completely off. Still limp, Stephen allowed his skull to thump back onto the pillow with a sigh of contentment. He reached up and ran his thumb across Cutter’s lips, tracing the outline of the smile and smiling in return.

“You know I love you, right?” Stephen asked softly.

“Yeah.” Cutter’s voice was rough with emotion. “Me too.” 

He nipped quickly at the digit against his mouth, and when Stephen laughed and pulled it away, he ducked his head and ran his tongue from Stephen’s navel to the edge of his trousers. When Stephen responded with a whimper, Cutter proceeded to tease him to within an inch of madness.

Very slowly, he slipped the button from its hole and folded the waistband back. Looking up, he saw Stephen watching him, the cobalt of his irises only the tiniest rim around pupils dilated with arousal.

Cutter smiled and, keeping his eyes on Stephen’s, he pulled the zip down, so slowly that they could hear each tooth clicking as it was freed. Stephen was gasping, cock hard and pressing against his pants, bulging into the gap being created as the zip lowered. Cutter dropped his head and pressed his lips against the fabric, already moist with the pre-come leaking out of the swollen glans. 

Stephen shuddered and pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes. “Fuck, fuck, fuck,” he whispered.

Taking pity on him, Cutter sat up and slid off to the side for a moment to pull Stephen’s trousers, socks and pants off, dumping them off the side of the bed. The younger man barely had time to pull his hands away from his eyes before Cutter was settling back between his legs again.

Slowly moving their naked forms together, Cutter slid up Stephen’s body to kiss him deeply and passionately. Stephen responded, tangling their tongues together as he wrapped his legs round Cutter again, pushing their crotches against each other, dragging moans from them both. Gasping a little, wondering where all the oxygen in the room had got to, Cutter sat up and ran his hand down Stephen’s stomach to wrap firmly around his erect cock. Stephen shuddered and grabbed handfuls of the sheets, tightening his fists on the fabric. Moving to Stephen’s side, Cutter leaned down and kissed him softly.

“Are you positive you want this?” he asked.

Stephen opened blurry and unbelieving eyes. “You have to ask?” he demanded. “Bloody well get on with it! You’re going to drive me completely mad!”

Cutter chuckled. “Yeah, okay. As long as you’re sure.” 

“I’m sure already,” Stephen whined. “For fuck’s sake, please! Do you want me to beg?”

Cutter raised his eyebrows and made a considering face, hand leaving Stephen’s cock to gently roll and squeeze his balls. “Actually, that sounds like a pretty good idea,” he said. At Stephen’s outraged whimper, he relented. “But not tonight.”

Cutter nudged Stephen over onto his side with his top leg bent a bit, still fondling his balls. “This will be easier on you,” he said quietly. He grabbed the tube of lubricant from the table at the end of the bed and coated a finger liberally. “Remember last night?”

“Um-hum,” Stephen murmured, concentrating on the feelings as Cutter slid a finger down his crack and circled his puckered hole. “That’s nice,” he whispered. “More.”

Cutter obliged, adding more lube and pressing slowly inside with just the tip of the finger, before pulling back out for more circling. He repeated the movement a few more times, going a little deeper on each iteration, until he felt Stephen’s hips starting to move, just a little, along with him. The next time he pressed in, it was with two slick fingers, still slowly, but inexorably. Stephen’s arse stilled for a moment, then he took a deep breath, let it out and the tight sphincter loosened. 

“Good,” Cutter crooned. “That’s good.”

“Yeah,” Stephen breathed. “More.”

“Pushy.”

“Um-huh.” The last syllable came out half an octave higher as Cutter’s fingers drove deeper and rubbed across the nub of his prostate. “Holy hell!” Stephen buried his head between his forearms and moaned. Cutter knew he’d felt a sudden jolt almost like electricity as his hips stuttered against Cutter’s hand. “The fuck. . .”

“Your prostate.” Cutter could hear his own accent getting stronger, the r’s starting to roll harder along with the movement of his fingers.

“Do it again.” For good measure, Stephen added, “Please.”

Cutter grinned and kissed the back of his shoulders. “Sure, no problem.” 

He obeyed and Stephen shuddered again with a groan.

“Please, I want you,” the younger man whispered. “Please, now.”

“Soon,” Cutter responded. “Soon.” Adding a third finger, he slid them in and out, making sure Stephen was stretched sufficiently that he wouldn’t feel too much pain on penetration. Once he was sure his lover was relaxed enough, Cutter pulled his fingers out and quickly added some lube to his own hard, aching cock. Christ, who knew that just fingering Stephen would make Cutter himself ready to shoot?

Stephen whined at the emptiness and pushed back. Cutter held his hip and pressed his cock against the loosened opening, slowly but inexorably pushing in. Stephen wasn’t having anything to do with slow, and as soon as the head made it past the muscle and he knew he wouldn’t tighten up, he shoved back against Cutter, ramming the cock hard into him, and right against his prostate. He yelled and shuddered hard.

“Fuck, are you okay?” Cutter was ready to pull out in a second.

“Don’t you dare leave me,” Stephen ordered firmly, gasping a bit. “That was. . .” He tightened up and then shivered again as Cutter’s cock twitched inside him, “That was amazing. Move, damn it.”

“Silly fool,” Cutter breathed fondly, as he started to thrust slowly, pulling back until the head was almost out, then gliding firmly back in, aiming to just graze Stephen’s prostate each time.

He continued to fill Stephen over and over again, knowing he was setting off sparks behind his eyes on every thrust. Stephen began moaning softly in time with the cock pressing against his prostate, feeling the shaft penetrating deeply as Cutter’s balls pressed against his cheeks.

Cutter knew that Stephen was completely lost in the sensations, unconscious of his hips undulating, pushing back against Cutter’s every thrust, striving to deepen each penetration even more. The stretching, burning sensation that Cutter remembered from the last time he’d been fucked had to be overloading Stephen’s sanity, leaving him aware of nothing outside his own body and what was happening to it. Then Cutter changed angle and speeded up his thrusts, shoving against Stephen’s prostate harder and faster, and reached forward to wrap his hand around Stephen’s cock, squeezing and stroking in time with his pumping hips. The pressure on his cock, the hardness filling him and the electric jolt of prostate stimulation all combined to wrench a climax from Stephen that almost made him pass out. He stiffened, cried out and spurted ropes of come all over his chest and the bed, his arse tightening like a vice around Cutter’s cock.

Cutter rammed home as hard as he could and erupted inside Stephen, filling him, and then collapsed against his lover, gasping, still very gently stroking Stephen’s over-sensitised cock.

“Oh, my fucking god,” Stephen whispered.

Chuckling tiredly, Cutter slowly and carefully pulled out. Stephen winced as the head passed through the still-twitching sphincter. Cutter checked him quickly; he looked a little sore but there was no blood and he was closing easily. Grabbing his tee shirt, Cutter gently wiped them both clean before Stephen rolled over onto his back with a weary but extremely satisfied smile. Cutter grinned back and leaned down to kiss him. 

“Okay?” he asked.

“More than okay,” Stephen responded, returning the kiss with interest. “Wonderful, terrific, perfect, and I’m really, really ready to sleep.” His eyes were starting to blur, and the lids were drooping.

Cutter lay down, and Stephen cuddled in close, yawning. He rested his head on Cutter’s shoulder, and went out like a light.

Cutter smiled at the ceiling, completely content for the first time in years, and joined his lover in slumber.

xXx

Rolling over the next morning, Stephen winced a little bit. While last night had been mind-blowing, it had left him with a bit of a sore arse. And again he hadn’t woken up from a nightmare. Slightly worried, he lifted his head to gaze at Cutter, hoping the older man was still asleep. No such luck.

Cutter smiled back at him, quite obviously having been awake for a while. “Good morning. How are you feeling?”

Stephen returned the smile. “Great.”

At Cutter’s raised eyebrow, he added, “A little sore, but it’s a nice kind of sore.”

Cutter rolled him over onto his back and pinned him gently. Stephen knew he was working on distracting him, but there was no way he could resist as Cutter’s mouth lowered onto his. Then he felt his legs nudged apart a little, and a warm, slick finger slowly massaged his tender hole, dipping in just slightly every few strokes, slowly and gently soothing the puckered flesh. When the hell had the man got the lube?

“Bloody hell,” he whispered against Cutter’s lips, then tucked his head into Cutter’s neck and moaned softly as his morning hard-on really started to make itself felt.

Cutter laughed and slithered down the bed, using his free hand to stroke Stephen's cock in time with the gentle circling of his other finger. 

“Fuck, fuck, fuck.” Stephen didn’t even realise he was chanting in time with the strokes as his hips started wriggling under the double stimulation. When Cutter engulfed his now aching cock and sucked hard, lashing the head with his tongue, Stephen came into his mouth with a strangled shout. 

Cutter slid back up the bed to tangle tongues so that Stephen could taste himself. Stephen uncrossed his eyes and took a deep breath. Looking into Cutter’s eyes, he started to slide down the bed himself. The older man stopped him.

“You don’t have to,” Cutter said seriously.

Stephen licked his lips. “I want to,” he said quietly. Then he grinned. “I’ll probably be crap at it, but I’d love to try.”

Cutter chuckled. “Just do what you like. It’ll be fine.” He lay back to let Stephen play.

Eyes firmly on the target, Stephen slowly and gently reached out to wrap his fingers around the hard cock in front of him. With his other hand, he started to card softly through the gingery curls that tangled around the base and covered the soft balls. He smiled in delight as he realised that Cutter really was freckled all over. When the Scotsman growled a little and twitched his hips, Stephen came out of his reverie and started to pay more attention to what he was doing.

He began stroking along the hard shaft, feeling the differences between this cock and his own: it wasn’t quite as long, but it was thicker, with a strong mushroom-shaped head. The slit was beginning to bead with pre-come, the fluid glinting in the light from the lamp. He dabbed at it with his tongue, testing, tasting, then started to lick the head all over with long wrapping strokes.

Cutter moaned.

Stephen began to enjoy himself. Easing his position, he slowly sucked the tip of the hard shaft into his mouth, rubbing his tongue across the slit and down around the lower rim of the head. All while rolling the furred balls in one hand and gliding with a firm grip up and down the shaft with the other.

Cutter started cursing softly.

Taking pity on his lover, Stephen speeded up his movements, gripping harder, sucking harder, squeezing the rapidly-rising balls between his palm and fingers, rolling them slowly back and forth. One last movement, a very slight rake of his bottom teeth across the fraenulum, and Cutter stiffened and spurted thick come into his mouth. Stephen jumped and gasped a little at the surprise, but then decided he rather liked the salty, slightly bitter taste. He licked the head clean and with one last squeeze, which elicited a rather tired little twitch, he slid up and kissed Cutter with a grin.

“So?” he asked.

Cutter opened his eyes and hummed. “Not bad,” he joked. “Quite good for a first time, actually. Lots more practice, I think, and you’ll be an expert.”

Stephen laughed and dropped his head to Cutter’s shoulder, rustling around until he was comfortably nestled. “I think I’m going to enjoy that.”

xXx

It was another hour before they bestirred themselves and crawled out of bed. Once they finally arrived in the cafeteria, they met Jenny on her way out.

“I have some news,” she said to Stephen. “Come to my office when you’re done here.”

Stephen's eyes, sapphire in the fluorescent light, brightened. “I’m official?”

She nodded. “Yep. I have everything ready for you. We can work on finding you a place now; when you decide where you want to live, just let me know.”

Cutter stiffened a little, and Stephen looked a question at him. Cutter couldn’t make himself ask, but he really didn’t need to. His expression said it all. Stephen smiled. “I don’t think I need a place,” he said softly. “I already have one.”

Jenny chuckled and Cutter beamed at him. “Aye,” the professor said. “We go home tonight.”

They nodded to her and headed in to fill very empty and loudly growling stomachs. All was right with their world.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> An intruder and an anomaly shout cause trouble.

Once Stephen moved into Cutter’s home, it took them less than a week to settle into a routine: Cutter getting a little extra sleep while Stephen went on a run and took a shower; then Cutter showering while Stephen cooked breakfast; and lastly Cutter cleaning up the kitchen while Stephen changed the sheets on the bed, before they left the house together. They both laughed frequently over Abby’s cheeky housewarming present: a dozen sets of bed sheets . . .

Cutter’s reports on the anomalies and creatures had never been so timely, complete, or readable. He was ecstatic to realise that he even had enough extra time to work on research with Connor without having to spend hours of overtime on it. Connor and Abby seemed quite pleased with the changes, also, and Cutter had even noticed that Captain Ryan was smiling more often and Lester was actually becoming quite benevolent. 

Things were going so well that Cutter started to worry.

Two weeks after Stephen moved in, Cutter woke suddenly. The bed beside him was cold, so Stephen was already up. There was no sound of the shower, so Stephen wasn’t back from his run yet. Then why was Cutter absolutely sure that there was someone else in the house?

He swung out of bed and grabbed the nearest pair of jeans, which luckily were his own, pulled them on and moved quietly to the door. Opening it a crack, he peered down the passage. Nothing. But now he could hear more clearly that there was indeed movement in the living room. Glancing around, he cursed the fact that they didn’t keep anything in the bedroom that could easily be used as a weapon. After pulling a tee-shirt over his head he grabbed a belt with a strong buckle to wrap around his fist, metal end hanging free. It was the best he could come up with.

Prowling as quietly as he could down the stairs, he kept a weather eye out behind him as well, just in case. Once he reached the living room archway, he took a deep breath and stepped out quickly, ready to yell. The breath wheezed out of him as if he’d been punched when he saw his ex-wife standing by his desk, going through some of the papers scattered across the surface.

“What the bloody hell are you doing in my house?” he demanded.

“Your house, Nick?” Helen Cutter smirked. “It was our house last time I checked the deed.”

“Aye,” Cutter responded dryly. “Last time you checked the deeds was before I divorced you for desertion.”

Helen’s eyes widened momentarily, then she smiled sweetly and moved across the room toward him. “I didn’t desert you, Nick. No matter how hard I tried, I just couldn’t make it back.”

Cutter retreated a step as she came closer, dropping one disdainful glance at the ample cleavage aimed in his direction. “Helen, you can play any games you like, but there’s no place for you here any more. I don’t want you back.” He stepped aside and gestured to the front door. “Now, I suggest you leave before I have to call for assistance.”

She gave him a look that did its best to combine confused with sultry. A couple of years ago it might have worked, but not this time. This time, Cutter was ready. 

“Nick, I really do need your help,” she started to say, but stopped, eyes wide, when Stephen opened the front door and stepped into the house. It would have been obvious to anyone that the clone of her former student was perfectly at home here; in fact, it looked as if he completely belonged in Cutter’s house.

Cutter heard his lover curse at the sight of Helen, and quickly shoved his ex-wife off balance as she pulled a pistol from her pocket and pointed it at Stephen. 

Stephen took one look at the gun, yelped and dived across the entry way toward the kitchen and the side door. The little Russian 9mm she had in her hand would be enough to do some serious damage to both of them if she got off some shots. And with at least 10 cartridges available to her, she could miss a number of times and still take them both down. 

Helen took off after him. Or tried to. Cutter tackled her before she made it out of the living room. He grabbed her hand and smashed it against the floor. Helen growled and kicked him off, scrabbling for the pistol, which had skittered under the couch. Cutter decided he wasn’t going to take any chances, and simply upended the couch onto her, before grabbing the gun and pelting out of the room after Stephen. Helen cried out and pushed madly at the heavy weight squashing her into the floor. 

Cutter met Stephen by the kitchen door, both of them wide-eyed and breathing hard. Stephen whispered, “If we can keep her busy for a few more minutes, the SF team will be here. I punched the panic button you gave me.”

Convincing Stephen that he really needed to carry a panic button with a direct connection to the ARC hadn’t been easy, but Cutter thanked every possible manner of divine intercession that he’d managed to do so. 

Cutter nodded and grabbed an empty scotch bottle to go with the 9mm ‘Skif’ he was still carrying, while Stephen, eyebrows flying at Cutter’s choices, contented himself with the meat tenderising mallet from the side drawer. They made it back to the living room just in time to hear a heavy crash, a curse, and the sharp, high-pitched clatter of glass breaking as Helen darted out of the French doors. Cutter decided it wasn’t worthwhile trying to catch her. 

Ten minutes later, the Special Forces team arrived to find Stephen and Cutter in the slightly trashed living room, with Stephen finishing up checking Cutter’s skin centimetre by centimetre for any damage that meant Helen had managed to get hold of some of the professor’s DNA. 

xXx

“I think you’re clear,” Stephen said with relief. “You have some pretty impressive bruises starting, but there aren’t any scratches or anything that looks suspicious. Are you sure she didn’t make it to the bathroom?”

“Positive,” Cutter said firmly. “She was still downstairs. As far as I know, we’ve left no razors, brushes or combs down here.”

Stephen thought for a moment. “What about shed hairs on the jackets?” He turned worriedly toward the coat-rack by the front door, only to be stopped and held close by his lover.

“Stephen, it’s okay,” Cutter whispered. “She didn’t get anything. She didn’t know you were here, and she thought she could talk me into helping. Really. We’re okay.”

Taking a deep breath, Stephen nodded. “All right.” The six-mile run followed by staring down the barrel of Helen’s 9mm pistol had overloaded him, and he was still riding high on the adrenaline overload. He couldn’t seem to stop shaking.

Ryan stepped back through the broken French door. “Nothing, Professor,” he said quietly. “She’s disappeared completely. There’s no sign even of which direction she took.”

Cutter nodded, still keeping an arm around Stephen. “I’m not surprised,” he said. “I suppose we could have chased her, but I didn’t think it was worth it.”

Ryan grinned. “Probably not. As quick as she is, you’d have to go full speed, and with her instincts, she’d probably still manage to run rings around you.”

Stephen wanted to be offended, but he suddenly couldn’t gather enough energy to be bothered. Adrenaline fatigue had hit, and he was crashing, completely drained.

Lyle entered the room from the kitchen. “Nothing,” he reported. He looked at Ryan, who nodded, then at Cutter. “Professor, maybe you need to set up some security on the house.”

Stephen, still trembling, looked at him hopefully. 

Cutter calmly nodded. “Can you set it up, Captain?”

“We’ll have a full home security package installed this afternoon,” the captain replied, giving the nod to his lieutenant. 

Lyle grinned and pulled out his mobile to call the company that had won the bid last week. They were ready for installation, he told them.

Stephen grinned a little through his shock. He’d known it would be difficult to see Helen again, but he hadn’t realised just how terrifying it would turn out to be. He’d come very close to freezing when he’d seen her. And that could have got both of them killed. With Helen's access to cloning technology, she didn’t really need either Cutter or Stephen alive. 

Shaking off the horror he felt at that thought, Stephen asked Ryan, “Is there a backup panic button we can get for both of us?” He held up the pocket type he’d been carrying for the last week. “She knows about this now.”

Ryan nodded. “There’s one we can add to your watches, and we can activate the GPS on your mobiles so it can’t be turned off. With all three, there’ll be no way she can lose us.”

“Unless she gets us through an anomaly,” Cutter muttered.

Stephen shivered again. “Don’t even think about that.”

xXx

Cutter yawned, still half-asleep as he finished going over Connor’s latest status report on his anomaly-locking tests. It was much too early in the morning to be digesting scientific data, but it sounded as if the lad had actually managed to come up with something that might fasten the damned things down until they closed. Ah, that was something he needed to check. What would happen to a locked one? Would it still close on schedule, or would the locking procedure inhibit that? He made a note to have Connor and his scientific team run the equations when they got the chance.

In the last two months, everything had settled down in their lives; as much as the lives of dinosaur-hunters could settle, anyway. There had been no sign of Helen since the day Cutter had repudiated her, although the home alarm had gone off once. When the security team arrived, they found nothing suspicious; the house was empty and still locked up tight. For all Cutter knew, it could have been a local dog peeing on the flowers next to the wall. At any rate, they seemed to be pretty low on Helen’s priority list. Even Stephen had begun to relax a little.

It had taken days for them to be able to talk about the cage room; days of Stephen putting it off with jokes and non sequiturs, and just plain old peevishness. Cutter had almost reached the point of being ready to shake his lover when Stephen had finally given in and started to talk. It had taken another week to make it through the experience and out the other side. The younger man had even moved into the spare room for the last couple of nights, both of them at the edge of breakdown over reliving the experience. Then on the third night, Cutter had woken up to find Stephen curled around him, cheeks damp, breathing hitched. He’d held his lover for hours that night as Stephen finally, gently, cried out his pain, anger and fear.

After Helen, Cutter had to admit to himself that he’d been a little leery of both living and working with someone, but for the last month, he and Stephen had been able to make an easy smooth transition from superior and second at work to lovers at home. Glancing across the office at his dark-haired partner nibbling his finger and frowning at his computer screen, Cutter realised that he had completely forgotten that this Stephen was a clone of the original. He was so like the old Stephen. Although, this man seemed to not carry quite the burden of guilt that had weighed on his ‘predecessor’ so heavily. He seemed lighter, more easily coaxed into having fun than Cutter had ever known. Not that he was complaining - he had the best of both worlds, here in front of him. His Stephen, without the pain. 

Stephen clearly felt the gaze on him and looked around, homing in on Cutter and blushing a bit at the hungry look he saw in the older man’s eyes. “Um, something you want?” he asked softly.

Cutter smiled back. “Just thinking how bloody happy I am.”

Stephen grinned and opened his mouth to reply, but was forestalled by the shriek of the ADD. He groaned and thumped his head on his desk. “You just had to say it, didn’t you?” he joked.

They stood up together and headed out the door, with Cutter apologising every step, and Stephen continuing to mock-berate him all the way. Letting Abby and Connor in on the joke caused a multiple piling-on to Cutter, who finally threw his hands up and started laughing. “Okay! I’ll never say it again!”

Stephen stopped dead and wrapped his arms around Cutter. “Say it as many times as you want,” he whispered, sending a frisson of desire down Cutter’s spine. Then he pulled back and said, “Just not bloody here!” 

Then the tracker took off, making sure he was the first person to arrive at the ADD. Cutter laughed and followed the younger members of the team, who were scampering after Stephen.

“Cliff Road,” Connor was saying as Cutter caught up. “Between Cheddar Gorge and the Long Wood valley; it’ll take about two hours to get there on the M4.” The young man punched the address into his SATNAV, then turned and made his way to the garage, walking along without even looking up as he opened his laptop to start researching the area in advance. 

Cutter and Stephen followed him, trading grins, and Stephen mouthed, “How does he not bounce off walls?”

Connor stopped dead and Stephen almost piled into him. 

“Um, Professor, I think we’re really going to need Jenny on this one.” Connor turned the laptop so Cutter could see the website he’d found. ‘National Nature Reserve’, ‘Spectacular Cheddar Gorge’, it showed. ‘Tour Bus’, ‘Cliff Top Walks’, ‘Lookout Tower’, were also advertised. “The anomaly looks to be at what they call the Horseshoe Bend, and it’s out of sight of the town, at least.”

“Bugger.” Cutter turned and started to pull his mobile from his pocket, only to have Jenny’s voice in his ear make him jump.

“Already on it,” Jenny said. “Luckily they don’t open until 10am. I’ve been in touch with the manager of the caves and gorge, and the local police. The ticket personnel will let people know that the tour bus is cancelled for the morning, and the police will block off the entrances to the Cliff Top walk, Jacob’s Ladder and the Lookout Tower, so no one can go up. I think the cave tours should be pretty safe; it looks as if the entrances are out of sight of the Horseshoe, so they’re going to keep on with those. It will help stave off too many complaints of lost income.”

Cutter grunted. It would have to do. They ran a quick check on the equipment, piled into the vehicles, and took off. Since they’d started loading fully-stocked kits into the official vehicles each morning, their response time had dropped dramatically. On the two hour trip, Connor updated everyone over their radios regarding the terrain and local flora and fauna. 

“Um, Professor, you’re not going to like this,” the young man said, finally.

Sighing, Cutter told him to proceed as Stephen took one hand off the wheel to pat his shoulder for a moment. Cutter grimaced.

“There’s lots of rare species there, plants and animals, and one endangered one, too, the Greater Horseshoe bat. Oh, but of course those don’t come out until dark. Um, right, there’s also loads of wild goats in the gorge; they put them there to eat the vegetation that’s overwhelming the rarer plants.”

“Crap.” Cutter got onto the radio. “Did you hear that, Ryan?”

The response came immediately and unhappily. “I did, Professor. We’ll do our best not to piss off any locals.”

Stephen chuckled. “The sooner we get there, the faster we can shove anything we find back through. Connor, was that your little locking gizmo I saw in the back?”

Connor nodded guiltily. “I thought we might have a chance to try it, maybe. It works in theory, I promise. We’ve double and triple checked the equations, and it doesn’t do anything untoward, I swear. We -“

Cutter interrupted, glancing over his shoulder with a grin. “Connor, it’s okay. I was looking over your report when we got the shout. It looks good. The only question I have is whether it will stop an anomaly from closing if it’s locked down.”

That hadn’t occurred to the young genius. How had he missed that? Connor grabbed his laptop and started plugging in figures. “Give me a few minutes,” he said, already hip deep in data. “Should be all right, but I just want to check one thing. . .”

Cutter and Stephen traded smiles as Abby leaned onto Connor’s shoulder to see what he was doing.

xXx

“Oh, shit.” Stephen stepped out of the Hilux and stared at the creatures in front of them, which were calmly grazing on the grass on the verge, totally ignoring the vehicles slamming to a halt within twenty metres of them. He looked up and down the winding road, glad to see that they were out of sight of any buildings. The cliffs hung over them to the south, making Stephen deeply uneasy. He hated being loomed over. 

However, since part of his job was to see if any of these large, low-slung, armour-plated creatures could have got loose from the area, he just shivered, turned his back on the cliff and started scanning the steep grassy slopes to the north. It looked as if they were going to be very, very lucky this time. There didn’t seem to be any open spaces that any of the creatures could have trundled through. He said so.

Ryan wasted no time. “Right, lads, make sure there aren’t any civilians hanging around on the cliffs, and get the portable roadblocks down around the corners. Make sure both road blocks are out of sight of that bloody thing.” He pointed at the anomaly nestled against the base of the cliff, twinkling and twisting. Then he turned his attention to the creatures, which were still paying absolutely no attention to them.

One did lift its head to gaze calmly at Connor, who was moving around to get video from all angles, but it gave no hint of taking exception to what he was doing.

“What do you think, Connor?” Cutter asked. “Nodosaurus?”

“I think so, yeah,” the young man replied, still videoing. “They’re definitely related to Ankylosaurs, with those plates on their backs, but they’ve no clubs on their tails. Let’s see. . .” He transferred his attention to the laptop he’d slung around his neck. “. . . Nodosaurus . . . Middle Cretaceous . . . About 5 metres long, about a ton . . . That fits . . . Plant eater, everyone will be pleased to know . . .”

Abby and Stephen grinned at each other, and Ryan actually sighed in relief. Something carrying that much armour would definitely make the soldiers happier if it was veggie, and therefore less likely to take chunks out of the men.

“So, how do we get them back through?” the captain asked.

Connor shrugged. “Well, according to the data, quote ‘for defence, Nodosaurus was probably limited to flopping on its belly and daring any hungry carnivores to try to flip it over and rip into its soft underside.’ End quote. So, your guess is as good as mine.”

“Great, we scare them too much, and they turn into the world’s biggest door-stops.” Abby's contribution made everyone stare at her, and Stephen actually chuckled. 

“What?” the girl added. “It’s true, isn’t it?”

Nodding, Stephen leaned over Connor to take another look at the information. “So, maybe if we just move in on them slowly, they’ll wander back through?”

Cutter agreed. “Can’t hurt to try. Everyone, grab a stick or something, and let’s get them home before they find any rare plants that they can turn into endangered species instead . . .”

Surprisingly, it worked much more easily than anyone had dreamed. The Nodosaurus were even slower-moving than their cousins, the Ankylosaurs, and they were surprisingly placid and gentle. All the group had to do was slowly walk in toward the creatures with branches waving in front of them, and the Nodosaurus raised their heads, stared at them for a moment, and started grazing their way back toward the anomaly. Less than fifteen minutes later, the final creature took one last bite from a bush beside the circling shards of time, and lumbered on home.

“Bloody hell, that was a little too simple,” Ryan said with surprise. “Those creatures acted more like overfed milk cows.”

Stephen thought so, too, but wasn’t about to tempt fate twice in one day by saying it out loud. 

“Professor, the anomaly’s starting to fade. Looks like it has . . .” Connor checked his readings. “. . . about an hour, maybe a little less.”

“Good,” Cutter said. “Connor, how long will it take you to set up your anomaly lock?”

“About five minutes,” Connor said hopefully, almost vibrating with suppressed excitement. “I can try it?”

“Yeah, okay,” Cutter replied. “What time is it?”

“Quarter past ten,” Stephen called out.

“Okay, that’s good. This was quick enough that we haven’t put too much of a crimp in people’s plans for the day, so you have half an hour.” Turning to Ryan and Jenny, he nodded. “Tell them they can have the south walk back in about an hour. They shouldn’t be able to see an almost faded anomaly from up above; and we’ll give them back the road and the north path when the anomaly’s gone.”

Jenny pulled out her phone to give the harassed manager the good news that he should start to have his Gorge back soon, while Connor ran for the back of the Hilux and his equipment case. Ryan checked on the general status with his men, receiving the good news that no one had come through the entrances to the Cliff Top Walks, and the roads were still clear.

Within the promised five minutes, Connor had the little machine hooked up about six metres from the anomaly, powered up, and was running tests. Once he got the last green light on his computer screen, he called Cutter over, and Stephen followed.

Stephen saw Abby’s grin as she watched them. She had definitely noticed that Stephen was trailing Cutter, eyes firmly fixed on the professor’s arse. Stephen blushed and shrugged. She snickered and moved over to the vehicles, sitting inside to talk quietly with Jenny.

Once Cutter arrived, Connor looked up, grinned in an expression that blended determination with excitement and folded in a little bit of nervousness, and said, “Allons y”, while punching the big red ‘go’ button on his screen.

The machine started whirring and everyone except Connor stepped back. The young man said, “It’s okay. It’s supposed to do that,” as he started examining the readouts on his screen. “Right, the anomaly’s radiating on the same band as all the others I’ve checked.” Typing quickly, he looked up at Cutter again, grinned, and raised his eyebrows.

Cutter grinned back and nodded. Connor started typing again, and the little machine’s whir elevated to a high whine. When the anomaly suddenly pulled in on itself, gathering in the scattered shards like an elderly woman wrapping herself in a shawl, everyone gaped.

“My god,” Stephen whispered as he stepped closer to the anomaly, which now looked less like a fractured diamond and more like a blown glass ball hanging in the air.

A sudden crack made him jump and duck backwards, as the anomaly exploded open again right in front of him. A cut-off yell from Connor and a thump as Ryan tackled the young man to the ground made Stephen look around in horror as he pressed his back to the cliff not five metres from the anomaly.

Connor’s anomaly-locking machine was sitting sideways on the ground with a small hole on one side and a very large one on the other. Someone had shot it, using hollow-point ammunition. A regular round would have expanded, but not nearly that much.

Everyone scattered, trying desperately to work out where the shot had originated from. Ryan spoke into his headset, sending men on a search pattern. Somehow they’d managed to miss someone coming onto the northern slopes. The captain looked around, checking every civilian’s position and status. 

Jenny and Abby were still safely in the Hilux. Ryan called over to them, telling them to keep their heads down. Abby’s response was muffled but highly affirmative. In fact, she stated that she probably wouldn’t be moving for the next week or so. Connor was behind and almost underneath the lead vehicle, holding his computer tightly and staring with horror at the wreck of his prototype. Stephen knew that he and Cutter were the ones in danger; he was pressed against the cliff beside a small outcrop, searching the slopes to the north with a pair of binoculars. If their assailant was to the east, he’d be okay; to the west, and he’d be totally fucked.

But at least he had some cover. Cutter was the one who really worried him. The professor had dived to the ground behind a couple of rocks, but that would only be of use if the shooter was at ground level. If the assailant was any higher than ten metres up the slope, he was totally out in the open.

“Professor, you need to get out of there,” Ryan called softly. “You’re too exposed in all directions.”

Cutter growled. “You think I don’t know that? Where the fuck did it come from? I can’t work out where to go if I don’t know that.”

Stephen lowered his binoculars. “Based on how the machine is sitting now,” he said quietly, “the shooter is on the south side, slightly east. That’s if the bloody thing didn’t bounce.”

“I don’t think it did.” Connor’s voice was a little shaky. “I think it just hit the ground and slid a little. It’s still mostly pointing at the anomaly.”

“Okay, then,” Ryan replied. “Professor, you need to get over to the Hilux. It’s the only vehicle that’s got a full side to the east.”

“Shit. Okay.” Cutter gathered himself and almost leaped to his feet, but on his first stride his boot slipped on the grass and his forward momentum stalled.

Stephen caught a glimpse of movement, and focussed in to see a man with a rifle halfway up the slope on the other side of the road. The rifle looked to be pointed directly at Cutter. He yelled and dived forward, propelling Cutter forward hard enough that the professor took five long steps and ran straight into the side of the Hilux as another hard snap of sound made everyone duck again.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> An end and a beginning.  
A/N: **Please read the entire chapter before pulling out the pitchforks and torches!** *g*

Cutter rubbed the side of his head where he’d smacked it into the door of the Hilux. He heard a yell from the north slopes and another couple of shots before he raised his head to peer over the bonnet and find out what was going on. There were two SF soldiers taking down a man with a rifle, and a woman running for her life with another soldier right behind her, slowly closing the distance between them.

Cutter slumped down. Damn it, it had to be Helen. Who else would want to stop them being able to control anomalies? He closed his eyes and took a deep breath, about to push himself to his feet when he heard Ryan yelling into his mic for a medic. 

Cutter opened his eyes to see the one thing he had never wanted to see again. The one thing he couldn’t stand. Stephen was lying on the ground, right where Cutter had been before he’d been pushed out of the line of fire. By Stephen. Who had, again, taken his place in danger.

“Oh, god, please,” Cutter begged as he scrambled over to them. “Please let him just be knocked out. Please. Please.”

His words faded as he caught sight of the blood soaking into the ground around Stephen’s body. His lover was still conscious, barely, moaning softly and trying to curl around the pain in his abdomen. Ryan was talking to him, holding him down to stop him from doing even more damage to himself.

Cutter knelt beside Stephen, shaking hands cradling his lover’s face to hold him still as Ryan and the newly-arrived Ditzy did their best to stop the bleeding and stabilise him. Cutter could see the blood bubbling out of the wound below Stephen’s ribcage as each gasping breath jarred him, with Ditzy packing the entrance wound on his side and the gaping exit hole in his back as quickly and thoroughly as he could.

“Shh, it’s okay,” Cutter said softly, over and over. “It’s okay.” The tears streaming down his face belied his words. This was bad. Really bad. He gently stroked Stephen’s hair.

“S - sorry,” Stephen whispered. “So s - sorry.”

“No,” Cutter murmured. “No, you have nothing to be sorry about. I love you. Hang on, please, Stephen, hang on. I love you. Don’t leave me.”

The tiniest of smiles stretched Stephen’s lips. “I love you too,” he managed to choke out. “These last months have been a blessing.” He paused to take a few shallow gasping breaths. “More than I ever dreamed I’d have.”

“Hang on, Stephen. Rescue is on the way. Hang on, love. Don’t leave me.” Cutter’s voice was almost obscured by the tears streaming down his face and the fear clogging his throat.

Stephen’s gaze moved past Cutter as he whispered, “Love you.” The cobalt eyes closed and the long body relaxed into the grass.

Cutter pulled him up, cradling the limp head on his shoulder. “Please, no. Please don’t leave me again. Please.”

Ryan and Ditzy pulled away to give Cutter some space, holding back Abby and Connor for the moment. Both were in floods of tears, Connor holding Abby close as she cried on his shoulder. Jenny moved forward and hugged them both, turning them away so they didn’t have to watch.

Fiver ran up. “Boss, we got the guy, but the son of a bitch took poison before we could stop him.”

“And the woman?” Ryan’s voice was like ice. “Helen Cutter?”

“Yeah. Dived into a Land Rover and took off across the fields to the west. We couldn’t keep up on foot. We put a report out on it, but I don’t hold out much hope.”

“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” the captain cursed. This was beyond bad. The bitch had got away again. This had to fucking stop. When they got back to the ARC, he was going to find some way to force Lester to pull every string the man had; call in every favour he was owed to find that damned woman and take her down.

xXx

Ditzy watched the professor closely as Lyle sent the rescue team away, letting them know they weren’t going to be needed. The medic sat beside Cutter and kept his hand on Cutter’s back. If all he could be was a grounding presence, then that’s what he would be. He’d known from the beginning that Stephen hadn’t had a chance. A hollow-point round directly through the abdomen? No way could the man have survived that. Too much damage. Way. Too. Much. 

He continued to stroke Cutter’s back as the professor cradled his lover and cried. Finally, Cutter looked up, eyes red and swollen. 

“Why?” he asked softly. “Why him? Why again?”

Ditzy shook his head, his own eyes moist. “Because the man couldn’t help but be a hero. Saving lives was the most important thing to him. Saving your life was worth any sacrifice.”

“I didn’t want that,” Cutter whispered into Stephen’s hair. “I never wanted you to die for me, Stephen, and you bloody did it twice, damn you.” He stroked the dark hair away from the pale forehead and kissed the warm skin. “Thank you.” He loosened his grip to allow Stephen to slide down and lie flat.

Suddenly, Cutter’s eyes widened as he continued to stroke Stephen’s face. “Ditzy,” he said quietly. “Shouldn’t he be getting cooler?”

The medic’s eyebrows headed for his hairline at speed. That was the last thing he’d expected Cutter to say. But he was right. Ditzy reached out and felt Stephen’s forehead. It was even warmer than normal, almost feverish. The men traded confused glances.

Stephen convulsed. And started breathing; heaving gasps that wracked his body. Cutter and Ditzy both scrambled away for a moment, until it became clear that breathing was all that was happening. With sudden, illogical hope, Ditzy opened Stephen’s shirt, to find bloodstained but unmarked skin. The men stared at each other, wild expectation in their eyes.

xXx

Cutter gasped. “My god. Oh, my god, what did she do to him?” Falling to his knees beside Stephen, he stroked his lover’s forehead and kept speaking, saying softly over and over again, “Stephen, come back. It’s okay. Come back, love.”

He looked over at Ditzy, the medic intent on the other side of Stephen. “His breathing’s steadying, his pulse. . .” Ditzy shook his head. “Fuck, his pulse is coming back up. It’s around fifty now, still getting stronger.” He stared at Cutter, eyes wide. “How the fuck is this happening?” He rolled Stephen over for a second to check the huge wound on his back; it was almost completely closed.

Cutter shuddered. “I don’t know, Lieutenant, but whatever Helen did when she made him, she buggered it up right royally.” He gave a watery smile. “Or gave me a wonderful gift. We’ll find out which it is in a few minutes, I think.”

The medic called Ryan over. “Boss, you’re not going to believe this.”

Ryan took one look at Stephen, bloody but now fully unmarked and breathing shallowly, and turned completely white. “What the fuck?” he whispered. He stared wide-eyed at Cutter and Ditzy. “What is he?”

Ditzy shrugged. “Alive. Somehow. We’re not sure what’s going on yet, so keep everyone away, okay?”

“Right,” Ryan gave another, now slightly suspicious, glance at Stephen and walked away to make sure no one came too close. 

Cutter sighed. At this point, they had no idea what was going to happen when Stephen awoke. Would he know them? Would he be their Stephen, or some sort of blank slate like Helen’s first attempts?

Ditzy tried to get him to shift away, to move back with Ryan and the others.

“Bugger that,” was Cutter’s response. “I go nowhere.”

“He could be Helen’s creation now,” the medic warned. “He could hurt you.”

Cutter stared blankly at him. “At this point, I don’t give a flying fuck, honestly. After the way this day has gone, nothing could possibly get worse.”

“I know how you feel,” Ditzy replied wryly. “I still can’t believe any of this. And I’m watching it.”

They waited, and watched, and hoped. Stephen’s breathing became deeper and his pulse stronger every moment that passed, until he began to moan softly and his eyes began to move under their closed lids. Cutter kept on stroking his hair gently and steadily, hoping to give his lover something to hang onto, something to find in the darkness, something to return to.

After another five minutes, Stephen’s eyelids began to flutter, then with a sudden jerk, they opened wide and his eyes, dilated with fear, began to jump back and forth between Ditzy and Cutter. His breathing stuttered and he tried to hitch himself along the ground away from them.

“Stephen, Stephen, it’s okay,” Cutter whispered, trying desperately to hang onto the shoulders writhing under his touch as Stephen’s hands wavered, touching his own arms, feeling his legs, running over his body again and again. 

“It’s okay. Please.” Cutter kept talking, repeating reassurances over and over.

Ditzy waved Ryan back as the captain started to move in. “Not yet.”

Staring into Stephen’s terrified eyes, Cutter despaired. This wasn’t his lover. He cradled Stephen’s head between his palms and continued to speak softly. “Stephen. Look at me. Look at me.”

When his lover’s gaze finally steadied on him and his hands stilled, cradling his torso, Cutter smiled. “It’s okay. You’re okay. You’re not alone.”

Stephen gasped, “The creatures. What happened? How did you stop them?”

Cutter and Ditzy traded looks. “We got them back through the anomaly a few minutes ago.”

“Anomaly?” Stephen’s eyes widened even more. “What anomaly? How did we get here? Where are we?”

Ditzy touched his shoulder gently to get his attention. When Stephen turned to him, still panting, he asked, “Where do you think we are?”

“The - the cage room.” Stephen’s breathing stopped and he curled into a ball. “Oh, god, it hurt.” He started gasping.

Cutter cursed. Damn it. Damn it. Damn it. “He’s fucking re-set!” 

When Ditzy stared at him, Cutter went on, still holding Stephen close. “He’s back to where he was when he woke up the first time. When Helen first brought him back. He’s. . . he’s. . .” Cutter couldn’t even say it. Stephen wasn’t his any more. All their time together was gone. Forgotten. Would things even work between them again? He bowed his head and cradled Stephen’s shaking body. 

Cutter was so involved in his and Stephen’s pain that he didn’t even notice as Connor and Abby put their heads together, then Abby grabbed the attention of the soldier in front of her and Connor ducked around behind the man, to run quickly up to the three and drop to his knees on the ground beside Stephen.

“Cutter,” he said sharply. “Put him down. Now. Please.”

Surprised into obedience by the tone of Connor’s voice, Cutter allowed the now silent clone to slide to the ground. Connor grasped his shoulders hard.

“Stephen,” said Connor, using the same domineering tone. “Listen to me. Helen cloned you. She brought you back. You escaped from her. You came back to us.” 

Stephen started to shake his head and tried to pull away. 

Connor followed, still talking brusquely. “You and Cutter found each other. You’ve been together for over two months.”

Stephen stilled, and his eyes narrowed, focussing hard on Connor’s lips as the young man kept talking. “You’ve been shot. You went aw. . . you died, then you regenerated. You’re back. Remember, damn it! Remember!”

Eyes closing, Stephen lifted his hands to brace them on Connor’s forearms as his eyebrows pulled together and he held his breath in his effort to concentrate. After a couple of moments, he opened his eyes and sought out Cutter. But before Cutter could get close enough to touch him, Stephen’s eyes stretched wide as he went into convulsions.

Ditzy grabbed Stephen’s head and cradled it, telling Cutter and Connor to hold Stephen’s body only enough to stop him from hurting himself on the rocks. Ryan started over to assist, but Ditzy nodded him back. They had enough help, since the seizure was already weakening. When the spasms eased, they released him. Stephen swallowed and opened his eyes, panting in exhaustion.

“What the fuck just happened?” he asked weakly, holding his head. “I have the world’s biggest headache.”

“I have no sodding idea,” Ditzy responded. “How do you feel?”

“Tired. A little confused.” Stephen tried to sit up. “Where’s Helen? And the shooter? Did they get them?”

Cutter’s muscles gave out in relief and he dropped to the ground with a thump. “You remember?”

“Yeah.” Stephen still looked as if he couldn’t quite see straight, but he turned his head to gaze at Connor, sat beside him. “How did you know?”

“That you’d remember if I kick-started you?”

Stephen nodded.

Connor grinned happily. “I’m a geek. That’s always the way it works in the sci-fi movies.”

Cutter leaned over and hugged him hard and long. “Thank you,” he whispered in the young man’s ear.

When Stephen attempted to rise, Ditzy pushed him back now. “Nuh-uh. Not yet,” he ordered firmly. “You stay down.” Turning to Ryan, the medic suggested that while they stored all their gear, that they dig out a stretcher to get Stephen to the Special Forces vehicle.

Stephen’s vociferous protests left Ditzy unmoved. “Look. Here’s the thing. You reset to your original condition. It looks like the memory pathways formed in the last few months were there, but the reset cut off your access to them. Connor telling you about them allowed you to re-build the connections. But it takes a few minutes for long-term memories to ‘stick’ as it were. We don’t want to bugger up any healing process that might still be taking place. So you’re going to rest, take it easy for a while. Okay?”

Cutter nodded and stroked Stephen’s shoulder. “Yeah, okay,” he said softly. “Please, Stephen?”

Settling back down rather grumpily, Stephen acquiesced with obvious reluctance. “Damn. All right. Fine.”

As they waited, Ditzy checked Stephen over for any problems. Once he got a baseline blood pressure and pulse, he told Stephen, “Five minutes. If your readings are the same in five minutes, you can sit up. If that makes you giddy, you will lie right back down on the stretcher. If it doesn’t you will let us help you to the truck. You’re very weak. The regeneration took a lot of your reserve energy. Okay?” 

Stephen nodded and closed his eyes. “Deal.”

“But you’ll be honest about how you feel, won’t you?” Cutter wasn’t about to let him get away with anything.

Cracking open one eye, Stephen grinned sardonically. “You’ll be watching me like a hawk, I know. I won’t be able to get away with even the tiniest of totters.”

Cutter laughed. “Exactly.” He turned to Ditzy. “So, while we’re waiting, any ideas on what just happened?”

xXx

Shrugging, Ditzy played for time by putting his equipment away neatly. He wasn’t sure the two - three with Connor still there - were ready for his idea. Then he remembered that most of the problems these men had encountered had been because of secrets kept; secrets that had seemed a good idea at their time. 

He sighed.

“I think that whatever that machine did when it built you did something very odd,” he said thoughtfully, looking back and forth between Stephen and Cutter. “I don’t know if it was a normal function of the machine, or if it was because you were rebuilt from brain tissue, or if Helen buggered something up when she faffed about with the equipment, but I think that the only way you will stay gone - stay completely dead - is if the damage to your body is so great that you run out of energy before the healing is complete. The incredible amount of healing that just happened, and your weakness now that it’s complete, lead me to that conclusion.”

Both Cutter and Stephen looked as if they’d been hit with a brick.

Ditzy smiled. “Yeah, kind of a cool thing. And since we were able to re-connect your memories since your first - um, regeneration? - I think that probably the only way you’ll lose them completely is if there’s brain damage and the brain cells themselves have to be rebuilt.” Crap, he was sounding, even to himself, as if this weren’t a completely mad situation. 

Cutter had Stephen’s hand wrapped in a grip that looked as if it should hurt, but Stephen seemed so shell-shocked that he wasn’t paying any attention to his extremities. 

Connor, on the other hand, was absolutely ecstatic.

“He’s just like a Time Lord,” he said in a ‘whisper’ that was barely soft enough to not grab the attention of everyone clustered by the vehicles, but was still loud enough to elicit a growl from Cutter. Then the young man deflated. “Except, the Time Lords remembered after regeneration.” He looked at Cutter, suddenly worried. “Professor, what will happen if he dies and we’re not there to remind him?” Turning to Ditzy, he asked, “Will he lose the memories?”

Ditzy shrugged. “I haven’t the faintest idea,” he said soberly, sitting in a more comfortable position to take another set of BP and pulse readings. “Possibly the memories will be overwritten by new ones.”

“And I’ll lose them,” Stephen said sadly. He shivered. “And if someone or something reminds me later? Will the memories start mixing up?”

“Since I left my crystal ball at home, there’s no telling about that,” Ditzy said firmly. “But it’s no use worrying about it right now. First, we get you home.” He gave a grin and held out his hand. “You’re completely stable,” he said. “Try sitting up; see how you feel.”

xXx

Stephen obeyed, coming to a seated position without ill effect. “I’m fine,” he said calmly, looking at Cutter, hoping he wouldn’t see repudiation or fear. Then he smiled. All he saw was joy and love.

“Welcome home,” Cutter said for the second time. “Welcome home, love.” And regardless of their audience, the professor leaned forward and gave Stephen a slow, deep kiss.

Laughing at the whistles from the men, Ditzy and Cutter put their arms around Stephen and hoisted him to his feet. Followed closely by Connor, who was grinning wider than a Cheshire Cat, they moved over to the Hilux, at first slowly, then faster as Stephen got his legs under him.

Everyone scattered to their respective vehicles.

As Cutter helped him to get comfortable in the front passenger seat, Stephen nibbled on his lip worriedly. “Cutter,” he started to say, then stopped.

“What, love?” Cutter gazed at him straightforwardly. “Something’s bothering you.”

Stephen nodded, then looked back into his lover’s eyes, allowing some of his fear to show. “After this, will I ever be safe?”

“What do you mean?” Cutter asked. “Hang on, tell me in a minute.” He motioned Connor and Abby into the back and moved around to the driver’s seat, looking around for Jenny. She waved from the lead Special Forces vehicle. Nodding, Cutter got in and started the truck.

“What is it?” he asked, now that it was just the team.

Trusting Abby and Connor as much as he trusted Cutter, Stephen took a deep breath. “If anyone not connected with the ARC finds out what happened, if I - if I die out in public, is there a chance in hell I won’t be shoved straight into a laboratory to be tested and experimented on for the rest of my life?”

The Hilux wavered on the road as Cutter reacted. “Fuck.” 

End


End file.
